WEBVTT - Ep. 777: So You Want to Be a Hide Hunter 0:00:08.760 --> 0:00:13.320 If this is the me Eater podcast coming at you shirtless, severely, 0:00:13.480 --> 0:00:18.560 bug bitten, and in my case, underware listeningst you can't 0:00:18.600 --> 0:00:22.920 predict anything brought to you by first Light. When I'm hunting, 0:00:23.079 --> 0:00:27.640 I need gear that won't quit. First light builds, no compromise, 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:31.480 gear that keeps me in the field longer, no shortcuts, 0:00:31.720 --> 0:00:34.840 just gear that works. Check it out at first light 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:35.760 dot com. 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:39.320 That's f I R S T L I T E 0:00:39.680 --> 0:00:43.840 dot com. 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:46.120 I got two things of major interest, well three things 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:50.360 if you count Phil. Phil printed off the script of Christmas. 0:00:51.320 --> 0:00:52.040 What do they call that? 0:00:52.440 --> 0:00:53.320 A Christmas Carol? 0:00:53.760 --> 0:00:58.280 Christmas? Carrol printed the script off. He's been highlighting his lines. 0:00:59.640 --> 0:01:01.200 Who are you? Who are you playing? Cratch It? 0:01:01.280 --> 0:01:04.160 Cratch It? Yeah, God, seems like you play Robert cratch It. 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:05.640 He was only a matter of time. 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:08.680 They didn't try to get you for Scrooge. 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:12.559 Uh, surprisingly not No, I think maybe a few more years, 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:13.720 wait till I get in the forties. 0:01:13.800 --> 0:01:15.319 Yeah, that was a joke. I don't think he'd be 0:01:15.319 --> 0:01:17.319 a Scrooge. Yeah, you know what I could picture you being? 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:17.840 Know what's that? 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:20.840 You know what he might be good at? You know 0:01:20.920 --> 0:01:24.200 the guy that like the that he's he's like the 0:01:24.520 --> 0:01:27.120 nephew and he's trying to get him. He's trying to 0:01:27.120 --> 0:01:30.360 get Scrooge fired up about Christmas, but then like Scrooge 0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:31.560 catches him, goofing on him. 0:01:31.880 --> 0:01:35.559 M They they tried to get me to play Fred 0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:36.520 two years ago. 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:37.880 You know your first name Basis. 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:38.640 Yeah, that's right. 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:43.280 You wanted you wanted more of a role. 0:01:44.360 --> 0:01:45.840 No, I was. I was doing a different place. 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:51.320 So it's just ya out there. God, just what is uh? 0:01:51.600 --> 0:01:53.280 What is want to crash its big lines? 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:57.160 Oh, he doesn't have a lot of big lines. He's 0:01:57.200 --> 0:01:59.160 he's just kind of like the anchor for like, you know, 0:01:59.280 --> 0:02:02.600 kind of the moral moral anchor. Yeah, that's the word. Good. 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:05.080 Phil won't be able to do that. 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:05.880 Now. 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:08.560 Probably the worst part about your what you got coming up? 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:10.840 If I had to say. 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:12.799 Here, I'm just I I would just like to say 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:15.280 I love how involved and interested you are in this 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:15.920 whole process. 0:02:16.000 --> 0:02:19.600 Oh, because I will be there my wife like without 0:02:19.639 --> 0:02:22.120 even knowing you're in it. My wife will be like 0:02:23.240 --> 0:02:27.400 alerting the family soon about what day this is happening, 0:02:28.040 --> 0:02:29.799 but what like we will be there. 0:02:29.880 --> 0:02:31.359 So I want to make sure when I get. 0:02:31.240 --> 0:02:33.120 There, I know what's going on sure, so I can 0:02:33.120 --> 0:02:35.000 whisper and be like, well, actually Phil doesn't even like 0:02:35.040 --> 0:02:37.560 this part, or this guy kind of bugs Phil, you know, 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:39.560 like he Phil wasn't very happy with this actor. 0:02:39.600 --> 0:02:41.120 I'll spill all the details. 0:02:42.760 --> 0:02:43.240 Along the way. 0:02:43.520 --> 0:02:47.080 But what might be challenging to you is because you 0:02:47.120 --> 0:02:48.040 have your own kids. 0:02:48.440 --> 0:02:50.680 I do, one of them's in the play with me, Steve. Oh, 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:54.120 he's playing my son. No, he's he's the middle child. 0:02:54.160 --> 0:02:56.680 He's he's there's there's a there's an older daughter of 0:02:56.720 --> 0:03:00.320 Cratchet's a middle boy, and then tiny Tim m he's 0:03:00.320 --> 0:03:01.040 playing the middle boy. 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:02.480 What I was gonna say it could be a problem 0:03:02.520 --> 0:03:05.320 for you is because you got to deal with your 0:03:05.360 --> 0:03:08.720 own kids all the time. You might not want to 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:11.880 go down there and need to deal with this whatever 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:15.000 kid it is playing Tiny Tim. You might be like, 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:18.400 so sort of consumed with your own kids and what 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:20.760 they got going on. Then all of a sudden you 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:23.280 got to get sort of like intimately familiar with this 0:03:23.400 --> 0:03:25.480 other kid while trying to take care of your kids. 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:27.280 Well, that's that's kind of crash. Its big scene is 0:03:27.280 --> 0:03:28.880 that he's got he's got to kind of break down 0:03:28.919 --> 0:03:31.600 over the death of Tiny Tim in one of the scenes. 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:33.160 That's the Oh I forgot that. 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:37.720 Well, you know, it's a good thing that your kids 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:41.080 aren't cast as tiny tim because they're too healthy, they're 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:43.640 too robust, strapping young men. 0:03:43.880 --> 0:03:44.240 Thank you. 0:03:44.360 --> 0:03:50.120 Yes, yeah, my little boy. You know how Matthew's on 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:51.320 crutches for six months? 0:03:51.320 --> 0:03:53.160 Oh yeah, were you making a bunch of tiny Tim? 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:57.600 Well, he's he's a very agreeable young man, very agreeable. 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:00.840 So well while he was on and crouches, that was 0:04:00.880 --> 0:04:05.600 his nickname because he he's so agreeable. Yeah, just a 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:08.760 cheery little fellah. 0:04:09.000 --> 0:04:13.600 Not you know, he's not disgruntled. Yeah, that's beautiful. 0:04:13.760 --> 0:04:16.560 Yeah, well keeps posted. Will Maybe maybe, Randall, maybe you 0:04:16.560 --> 0:04:17.920 and your wife would like to go with us. 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:21.239 I'd love to. I don't go to the theater enough. 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:23.480 You don't take in much theater. Well, I take in 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:24.039 one play. 0:04:24.520 --> 0:04:28.080 I went to Christmas Carrol, I went to film shows. 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:31.040 I went to Phil's last production and it was lovely 0:04:31.160 --> 0:04:33.960 and I was I was seated right behind JK. Simmons, 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:37.320 famous Montana JK. Simmons, and he loved it. 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:38.000 He did. 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:40.240 Every time Phil made a joke. I looked at JK. 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:41.280 Simmons and he. 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.920 Was just a you know what, I don't think. I mean, 0:04:44.960 --> 0:04:47.760 I'm not knocking on film. I don't think that that 0:04:47.839 --> 0:04:50.400 was I don't think it was genuine. No, I think 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:52.960 that he knew. He's like a big famous theater guy, 0:04:53.279 --> 0:04:55.280 and he's in theater, and so he's got to act 0:04:55.320 --> 0:04:56.000 like he's into it. 0:04:56.040 --> 0:04:57.320 I think he just might be part of it. 0:04:57.360 --> 0:05:00.479 But I think he's so into it that, you know, 0:05:00.560 --> 0:05:03.080 any good theater he gets, it's just like a shot 0:05:03.160 --> 0:05:05.840 of life into his blood, you know. 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:09.760 So like little date night, Well, it's gonna be kind 0:05:09.760 --> 0:05:11.799 of like a weird date night for you because it'll 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:13.919 be me like me and my wife and you and 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:14.359 your wife. 0:05:14.360 --> 0:05:17.640 That'll feel normal. But then they'll be my children. That 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:20.560 sounds like a normal outing for us. Yeah, because often 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:22.800 we don't bring children to anything. Yeah, because it wouldn't 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:23.479 work for us. 0:05:23.520 --> 0:05:27.320 Like she's gonna make them go, Yeah they won't, you know, sure, sure, 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:29.600 don't don't fill them. They're not gonna. 0:05:30.000 --> 0:05:31.360 I was eleven year old once as well. 0:05:31.400 --> 0:05:34.400 It's like I'm not gonna want to, but they'll be 0:05:34.480 --> 0:05:34.960 down there. 0:05:35.120 --> 0:05:37.960 I mean I've been I've been workshopping with Phil's as 0:05:37.960 --> 0:05:40.640 to how we can graft sort of the structure of 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:43.160 a Christmas Carol onto the live tour. 0:05:43.400 --> 0:05:44.320 I think it's brilliant. 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:48.279 Yeah, we can have ghosts of hunting season, past, hunting season, present, 0:05:48.320 --> 0:05:49.360 hunting season future. 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:52.720 Well you can appear this is gonna air random and 0:05:52.760 --> 0:05:54.880 that this doesn't happen, there's going to be some disappointed 0:05:54.920 --> 0:05:55.679 fans in the audience. 0:05:55.720 --> 0:05:57.760 So, well, whatever we come up with will have to 0:05:57.800 --> 0:06:01.839 be equally good or better. I don't I don't imagine. 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:03.520 I mean, this is a great idea. I'm just gonna 0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:07.720 say that. But whatever whatever replaces it or supplants it 0:06:07.760 --> 0:06:08.440 will be better. 0:06:08.640 --> 0:06:13.359 So Clay's planning on having Brent Reeves Fry Bluegills on 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:14.440 stage every night. 0:06:14.640 --> 0:06:15.960 I know I like that, but. 0:06:16.120 --> 0:06:17.960 And I like it too. But you either got to 0:06:18.040 --> 0:06:20.080 decide you're gonna bring it up with the venue and 0:06:20.080 --> 0:06:22.760 then they're gonna have like the They're gonna have like 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:24.080 the fire department down there, and. 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:27.520 They're gonna say, our very expensive and thick curtains are 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:29.240 gonna smell like fish for the next three months. 0:06:29.320 --> 0:06:31.760 Yeah, or you don't bring it up and see what happens. 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:34.200 Yeah, I don't know. 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:40.240 Uh, you know what's gonna tickle Phil's fancy he's gonna 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:41.320 get gell us. 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:41.960 Yeah. 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:45.960 I want to do a thing, Phil, and we're already 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:50.000 setting this into motion. I'm gonna do a thing where 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:52.240 it's called Interviews with a black. 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:55.960 Bear and who's the black bear? 0:06:56.440 --> 0:06:57.479 I haven't cast it yet. 0:06:58.400 --> 0:07:01.000 Is there gonna be a whole time gonna be called backs, 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:02.359 do some scene tests? 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:05.200 Because if I could interview any animal in the world, 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:07.720 I would interview a black bear about like what he's 0:07:07.800 --> 0:07:11.560 up to, what he was thinking? You're like, like when 0:07:11.600 --> 0:07:17.400 you ate the gear oil, like what you know? Like 0:07:17.400 --> 0:07:19.840 like I could see the first sip, right, You're like, 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:22.000 I can see why you might take a sip, but 0:07:22.080 --> 0:07:24.480 then but you kept eating. 0:07:24.200 --> 0:07:30.680 It is the twentieth trash can curiosity? Or is it 0:07:30.800 --> 0:07:32.840 just you can't break the habit? You know? 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:35.120 You throw out black bears as an example, Steve. But 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:37.920 I think if this, you know, takes off, I think 0:07:37.920 --> 0:07:39.720 going through a bunch of different animals would be very 0:07:39.720 --> 0:07:41.840 It would be a funny series. Interview with a turkey, 0:07:41.880 --> 0:07:42.880 interview with a with a dove. 0:07:43.040 --> 0:07:46.200 Yeah, like if you interviewed a black bear. If you 0:07:46.200 --> 0:07:48.720 could interview like a black beard that finds like Clay 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:53.200 Newcome's bait barrel. Yeah, okay, and then he slowly put 0:07:53.360 --> 0:07:56.600 like it'd be like, okay, well, dude, when you first 0:07:56.720 --> 0:07:59.040 found the bait barrel, didn't you think it was a 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:06.239 little like a little suspicious. Yeah, all of a sudden 0:08:06.880 --> 0:08:07.960 and he's like, here's a bear. 0:08:08.360 --> 0:08:10.840 He's like, you know, things hadn't really been going well 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:13.040 for me lately, and I thought maybe my luck had 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:14.240 finally changed. 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:18.760 And like yeah, and you knows, all of a sudden, 0:08:18.760 --> 0:08:20.800 there's like a platform up in a tree like by 0:08:20.920 --> 0:08:23.040 like does this stuff you know? 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.400 Yeah, register or like a black bear that finds his 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:28.640 way into a convenience store and he's caught on the 0:08:28.840 --> 0:08:30.160 close circuit television. 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:33.360 Yeah, yeah, did you know. 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:34.360 You were at risk? 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:36.719 So is this is this a bear that is is 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:40.040 post mortem? Like like it's a no, no no. 0:08:40.200 --> 0:08:43.320 That's why I like it's going to be a bear 0:08:43.400 --> 0:08:47.760 to his like his buddy gets their Yeah, I'm not 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:49.640 gonna like bring a bear back from the dead. 0:08:49.760 --> 0:08:51.599 You could do you could do a repetitive series and 0:08:51.600 --> 0:08:53.679 anytime a black bear is in the news, you just 0:08:53.720 --> 0:08:59.720 have the God I can't catch a break. Honestly, my 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:01.040 fan only so embarrassed. 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:04.360 Here here's the everything that will How did I What 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:08.120 did I say? There's three things of interest? It doesn't matter. 0:09:10.640 --> 0:09:13.080 I just got off the phone. I'm trying to Here's 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:16.439 what I'm gonna do. You guys ever preview radio live segments. 0:09:17.480 --> 0:09:19.160 We hold we hold this up. Phil said you can 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:22.120 hold this somewhere. So I want to preview. I'm trying 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:24.040 to get an interview with a guy I don't even 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.760 want to say who. I just spoke to a wildlife 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:32.440 enforcement agent. I don't want to spoil anything. I got 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:35.120 to fill out like a form. I got to fill 0:09:35.160 --> 0:09:37.400 out a thing to try to get him permission to 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:41.240 speak to us. He's got to take it to the suits. 0:09:41.720 --> 0:09:43.960 So I don't want to blow it. Yeah, I just 0:09:43.960 --> 0:09:46.400 got I just did ire my pre interview. Hold that up? 0:09:46.440 --> 0:09:51.520 Real nice. What Randall's holding is a wild mink pelt. 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:52.720 Did you know? 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:55.520 How's that feel? It's like a shiny Should I bring it? 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:00.080 Did you know? Did you know that if you if 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:06.400 you go in and buy fake eyelashes, there is a chance. 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:12.800 I don't want to put statistics on it, but there 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:16.400 is a very I'm not saying a probability, but a 0:10:16.600 --> 0:10:20.199 light like a good chance that when you buy fake eyelashes. 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:26.439 It is mink, not advertised as but it is actually mink. 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:28.839 And when you put that up and look at it, yeah, 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:31.920 my god, does that look like a nice eyelash. I 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:38.960 don't like that. Look just a big fake eyelash. Look. Yeah, 0:10:39.440 --> 0:10:43.120 not my style. But you know it's popular. 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:45.400 Yep, we'll probably fake I feel like it. I feel 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:47.000 like it came into popularity. 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:48.280 I feel like but it already went. 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:48.959 I don't know. 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:52.719 Oh, it's way popular, like in twenty years. If you're 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:54.840 dressing up for Halloween and you're dressing up as a 0:10:54.840 --> 0:10:58.320 twenty twenty five person for Halloween, you're gonna glue on 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:04.080 big fake eyelash, sure, and people will be like, oh, 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:04.800 I remember that. 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:10.560 But yeah, uh, mink are just striking. 0:11:10.920 --> 0:11:12.680 And I was wondering is that like enough to drive 0:11:12.760 --> 0:11:15.080 up the mink market. But then, man, think about how 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:17.320 many eyelashes are hide in that thing right there. Yeah, 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:20.720 there's nothing but it. You could do the whole town. 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:25.320 You could give every woman in town new eyelashes with 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:25.720 this mink. 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:27.880 We should try to make We should take a sliver, 0:11:28.120 --> 0:11:30.600 like a dental flos sized sliver off the side of 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:32.920 that and try to make a set of uh, fake 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:34.079 eyelashes for someone. 0:11:33.920 --> 0:11:38.719 In what they do when they're testing. I don't want 0:11:38.720 --> 0:11:40.480 to blow the interview. I wanted to give this last 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:45.440 little tidbit away against my better judgment. When they're testing 0:11:45.440 --> 0:11:47.199 a shipment, guess guess what the test is that I 0:11:47.200 --> 0:11:48.959 already tell you what the test did, and I like it. 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:50.040 Take a cigarette lighter. 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:52.480 Smell like hair. 0:11:52.720 --> 0:11:56.000 If it smells like burnt hair, it'll either smell like 0:11:56.040 --> 0:11:58.720 burning petroleum based or it'll be like, oh, that's burnt hair. 0:11:59.440 --> 0:12:03.120 That is a mink greake eyelashes made from a mink. 0:12:03.679 --> 0:12:04.360 And what I won't be. 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:06.199 Able to tell you even when we do the interview, 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:08.360 I won't be able to tell you the country of origin. 0:12:08.360 --> 0:12:09.000 It's not known. 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:12.960 We're not knowing if these mink are American cop mink 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:18.880 or European wild mink. Third thing of interest, can you 0:12:18.920 --> 0:12:19.720 put the photo film? 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:20.280 Let's do it. 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:22.520 This is a tremendous interest. You got your thing handy, 0:12:22.600 --> 0:12:25.880 I do. Randall and I just did a probably one 0:12:25.920 --> 0:12:32.040 of the best, probably our best piece of video work 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:36.839 ever in terms of what I think is interesting. Phil 0:12:36.920 --> 0:12:39.040 has a picture held up of me and Randall here 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:45.439 holding two it's the big hunks of fat that come 0:12:45.440 --> 0:12:48.480 off the back of a buffalo. It's called the depoey, 0:12:49.320 --> 0:12:55.200 the depouey French. If you imagine like picture that you 0:12:55.280 --> 0:12:58.320 pull the hide off a deer, because more people have 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:00.400 done that than pulled the hide off a buffalo. Hat 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:02.280 off deer, and he's got like the big caps of 0:13:02.280 --> 0:13:05.319 fat on a real healthy deer, the big caps of 0:13:05.360 --> 0:13:08.200 fat that lay over the backstrap. But these are in 0:13:08.200 --> 0:13:11.079 this picture we're holding up. These are like giant slabs 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:14.120 of fat removed from over the backstrap and hump of 0:13:14.160 --> 0:13:14.680 a buffalo. 0:13:16.559 --> 0:13:17.760 And working on. 0:13:17.600 --> 0:13:21.360 The latest installation of meat Eater's American history, The Hide Hunters, 0:13:21.440 --> 0:13:25.439 eighteen sixty five to eighteen eighty three, we ran across 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:29.680 this passage which doctor Randall's share with you. 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:36.200 Another important article of food, the equal of which is 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:39.880 not to be had except from the buffalo, is dupoyer 0:13:40.280 --> 0:13:44.160 or depeuwey depewy. It is a fat substance that lies 0:13:44.200 --> 0:13:46.800 along the backbone next to the hide, running from the 0:13:46.840 --> 0:13:49.560 shoulder blade to the last rib, and is about as 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:52.840 thick as one's hand or finger. It is from seven 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:55.880 to eleven inches broad, tapering to a feather edge on 0:13:55.920 --> 0:13:59.040 the lower side. It will weigh from five to eleven 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:01.800 pounds according to the size and condition of the animal. 0:14:02.400 --> 0:14:05.760 This substance has taken off and dipped in hot grease 0:14:05.840 --> 0:14:08.400 for half a minute, then is hung up inside of 0:14:08.440 --> 0:14:11.600 a lodge to dry and smoke for twelve hours. It 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:15.880 will keep indefinitely and is used as a substitute for bread, 0:14:16.320 --> 0:14:20.880 but is superior to any bread that was ever made. 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:24.680 Yes, we made it. We made a whole video about 0:14:24.720 --> 0:14:27.960 making it. We followed those instructions. 0:14:29.200 --> 0:14:33.320 Why do people say to the tea, I don't know. 0:14:33.400 --> 0:14:35.200 We followed them to the great question. You want to 0:14:35.200 --> 0:14:38.800 know why the whole nine yards? You know what that means? No, 0:14:39.120 --> 0:14:40.880 it's like the in a peeth? Is it was that? 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:43.360 What was that like spitfire P thirty eight airplane in 0:14:43.400 --> 0:14:44.000 World War Two? 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:48.880 Uh? Is it a P thirty eight? A P thirty 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:50.320 eight is a thunderbolt? I believe. 0:14:50.440 --> 0:14:54.800 Oh, well, you know the Nate Mason, Yeah, big army guy. 0:14:55.080 --> 0:14:55.200 Hm. 0:14:56.200 --> 0:14:58.800 He was telling me that that that belt, that machine belt, 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:01.239 the animal belt twenty. 0:15:01.000 --> 0:15:01.720 Seven feet long. 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:03.680 So to give him the whole nine yards is to 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:07.640 give him twenty seven feet am or out of that aircraft, gotcha. Yeah, 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:09.520 I don't know why people follow stuff to the tea. 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:12.760 We filed it to the t and I'm not gonna 0:15:12.760 --> 0:15:14.600 tell you what happened, you know how I tease the 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:16.760 mak thing with I'm not telling the secrets. I'm not 0:15:16.800 --> 0:15:20.800 telling the secrets of what happened with our depui. Yeah, 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:24.040 this project is sitting with Seth Morris right now, who's 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:24.640 editing it. 0:15:24.920 --> 0:15:27.880 I had a crisis of confidence in my answer the 0:15:27.880 --> 0:15:30.920 p third eight is the lightning, Just correcting myself. 0:15:31.080 --> 0:15:34.080 So going back there, and I did fact check Nate 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:35.800 Mason on that he takes a lot of pride and 0:15:35.880 --> 0:15:37.360 being able to offer up little things like that. 0:15:37.520 --> 0:15:40.440 Yeah, now that I feel like I have heard that somewhere. 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:42.800 There's a lot of pride in that kind of stuff. 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:45.200 If he waves you down, you know, on the staircase 0:15:45.280 --> 0:15:46.800 or something, it's going to be to tell you like 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:48.480 a little tidbit, or to correct you. 0:15:48.400 --> 0:15:50.240 About something you got wrong. Yeah. 0:15:51.120 --> 0:15:53.280 Uh, here's an interesting one. Now we're gonna get We're 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:55.080 gonna talk a whole bunch more about Buffalo because we're 0:15:55.080 --> 0:15:56.680 talking about the hide Hunter era. 0:15:56.960 --> 0:15:58.920 Really quick, just before you get into this and can 0:15:58.960 --> 0:16:02.600 completely derail you. David says that there's no consensus about 0:16:02.600 --> 0:16:05.680 where to a tea comes from, but the best accepted 0:16:05.680 --> 0:16:08.080 candidate candidate, is that it's a shortened version of to 0:16:08.200 --> 0:16:11.840 a tittle. The word tittle refers to those tiny little 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:13.800 editions you have to make when writing letters like a 0:16:13.960 --> 0:16:16.040 like dotting an I or a JA or crossing a T. 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:20.840 Hmmmm, that's not like something Bob Crash did say. 0:16:22.480 --> 0:16:27.240 To the tidy tim But sir, it's Christmas. Is that 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:29.800 a Bob Cratchit line? 0:16:29.880 --> 0:16:32.360 Yes, it is, Actually he does. He tries, He tries 0:16:32.400 --> 0:16:34.400 to leave right at the stroke of five or six, 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:36.920 and Screwge gives gives him a dirty look and he says, 0:16:36.920 --> 0:16:37.960 but sir, it's Christmas. 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:40.960 Oh God bless it's the biggest goose. 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:44.040 In all of London. 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:48.240 Here's a really good one that a guy is sent in. 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:52.200 We have done one of these in a while. First 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:55.440 of this guy starts off by saying he's rarely heard 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:58.720 our team prep pet that points to me passed up 0:16:58.720 --> 0:17:02.840 an opportunity to discover argue about semantics. So check this out. 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:15.359 This this cannot stand. This guy recently moved to South Carolina, 0:17:16.720 --> 0:17:19.639 gets to study in the state hunting rags just to 0:17:19.640 --> 0:17:23.679 get a grip on what's going on, okay, and he 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:28.480 notices within South Carolina's hunting rags that they have an 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:39.640 explicitly stated still hunt season, still hunt season. Now, ask 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:43.000 any American boy what still hunting is and what are 0:17:43.040 --> 0:17:43.679 they going to tell you? 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:50.080 Creeping quietly through the woods yep, slowly, slowly, slowly, shaving 0:17:50.080 --> 0:17:51.280 a deer before it sees you. 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:53.960 Take a couple of steps, yep, stop and listen. Take 0:17:54.000 --> 0:17:58.679 a couple steps, stop and listen. Still hunting. So he's like, 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:01.400 why would they have a season where you can only 0:18:04.600 --> 0:18:09.320 still hunt? So he calls Fish and Game to say, 0:18:09.880 --> 0:18:11.199 what's up with how you can? Like? 0:18:11.280 --> 0:18:11.480 Why? 0:18:11.560 --> 0:18:13.800 Why? Why are you saying like you can only hunt 0:18:13.840 --> 0:18:17.440 this method? You mean you can't you can't stand hunt 0:18:18.160 --> 0:18:21.520 during the still hunt season, to which they say, no, 0:18:21.640 --> 0:18:26.159 you dummy. Still hunting is hunting without a dog. It 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:27.600 is the no dog season. 0:18:27.960 --> 0:18:28.160 Yeah. 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:30.040 Who in the world? 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:32.359 I would have just called it quiet? 0:18:32.960 --> 0:18:34.080 I call it no dog time? 0:18:34.320 --> 0:18:36.680 Right, a good song? 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:40.280 I call it no dog Time? 0:18:41.480 --> 0:18:43.359 Like is it a sandy song or is it like 0:18:43.400 --> 0:18:44.640 an upbeat pop song? 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:51.600 No, it's like a country party song. Parties it's any 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:58.920 parties song. Yeah, that's a great one. That's a great one. 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:01.119 I have never but it might be the like, I 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:03.080 don't know if you would like, I'd be curious. I 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:04.760 don't beat a dog on it because I'd be curious. 0:19:05.280 --> 0:19:05.640 That's good. 0:19:06.720 --> 0:19:09.159 Oh there I was with already halfway through the lyrics. 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:12.480 Okay, here, man, I didn get into this. 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:15.600 Now I get into this. I was with dan and 0:19:15.640 --> 0:19:23.280 read Isbel okay from God's Country podcast, and we're eating this. 0:19:23.359 --> 0:19:26.679 We're in this restaurant and they got like a paddlefish eggs, 0:19:26.840 --> 0:19:30.119 paddlefish caviar and I'm eating mine and I get a 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:33.119 little bit of that caviar on my upper lip, like 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:38.520 and it's like Marilyn Monroe's birthmark. Dan Isbel goes, Marilyn Monroe. 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:40.720 That's good. 0:19:40.840 --> 0:19:44.399 But then there was like I everyone at the table 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:49.640 detected a pause before he like did like a gotcha yeah. 0:19:51.160 --> 0:19:55.920 And the debate was did he know or did it 0:19:56.080 --> 0:19:58.560 only occur that he was going off the birthmark? And 0:19:58.560 --> 0:20:00.080 said Marylyn because MARYL. Monroe has. 0:20:01.520 --> 0:20:02.080 Did he know. 0:20:03.600 --> 0:20:08.960 Before the delivery? The row connection. So we wanted to 0:20:09.040 --> 0:20:12.440 get the security camera footage from within the restaurant to 0:20:12.600 --> 0:20:15.760 see if like when the twinkle in his I felt 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:18.280 the twinkle was like delayed, like he goes like marily 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:21.600 Monroe and then and then does a hah yeah yeah. 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:24.720 But he's like, no, I knew all along. That's why 0:20:24.840 --> 0:20:25.240 I said it. 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:25.760 I don't buy it. 0:20:26.000 --> 0:20:27.480 I don't buy it for no one bought it. No. 0:20:27.760 --> 0:20:30.920 I was like, there was like you said it, and 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:32.800 then there was like a beat and then it. 0:20:32.880 --> 0:20:36.560 Hit Yeah, I'm I'm dubious. 0:20:37.280 --> 0:20:38.480 I mean, I'm still impressed. 0:20:39.240 --> 0:20:43.760 Yeah, it's great. Why was that talking about her dogs? 0:20:44.640 --> 0:20:45.040 Dogs? 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:49.840 You don't mean to dog on the Why about I 0:20:49.960 --> 0:20:52.840 got talking about the row? Well the way he did 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:55.719 one of those, he said, well I just did one. 0:20:55.800 --> 0:20:57.600 He said, I don't mean a dog. That what it was. 0:20:57.800 --> 0:21:02.680 That's what it was. So Marylyman, Now, I would be 0:21:02.720 --> 0:21:05.440 curious if you went to dog hunting states. And I 0:21:05.480 --> 0:21:07.080 don't know, I honestly don't know the answer that this 0:21:07.160 --> 0:21:08.920 people can write in like if I went to a 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:13.280 dog hunting state, So I go to Arkansas, right South Carolina, 0:21:13.280 --> 0:21:18.320 there are many left, which I've makes me a little 0:21:18.359 --> 0:21:21.720 bit sad. Uh And I said, hey, I'm gonna still 0:21:21.800 --> 0:21:24.520 hunt like or well they people said that, how'd you 0:21:24.560 --> 0:21:26.159 get that buck? And I said, oh, I was like, 0:21:26.760 --> 0:21:29.760 stile still hunting. Would they be like, huh, he was 0:21:29.840 --> 0:21:30.840 hunting without dogs? 0:21:33.200 --> 0:21:35.240 Or would they be like he was actually still hunting? 0:21:35.520 --> 0:21:36.520 Yeah? You know what I'm saying. 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:39.560 Yeah, Like, if it's a universal convention in states that 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:42.600 have dog hunting, that's still hunting. Is hunting without dogs? 0:21:42.760 --> 0:21:44.840 Or do even dog guys look at the rags and 0:21:44.840 --> 0:21:45.159 they're like. 0:21:45.200 --> 0:21:51.320 What Yeah, they could have pretty much picked any other 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:56.480 descriptor there and it would have caused less confusion. 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:03.639 Here's another quick one. This is good think him in 0:22:04.000 --> 0:22:08.000 an obscure question, Steve may be uniquely equipped to answer. 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:09.600 And I gotta tell you right off the bat, I'm 0:22:09.600 --> 0:22:13.080 gonna let you down home, buddy. But it's good. There's 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:15.920 a phenomenal book that I recommend anyone out there called 0:22:16.000 --> 0:22:20.960 Shadows on the Koyukuk. It's about the It's about a 0:22:21.560 --> 0:22:26.120 Koya Khan. So the Koya Khan people. 0:22:25.880 --> 0:22:31.400 Are are like a like a tribe. 0:22:31.520 --> 0:22:34.200 It wouldn't beat that, but like a tribe of Native Alaskans, 0:22:34.280 --> 0:22:37.920 and they and and these Native Alaskans, the Koyu Khan 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:40.840 people are centered around the Koyukuk River which flows into 0:22:40.840 --> 0:22:45.200 the Yukon River. Sydney Huntington is a is a koya 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:48.520 Kan man and Shadows on the Koyakok is like his 0:22:48.640 --> 0:22:51.920 story of growing up on the river. It's it's a 0:22:52.080 --> 0:22:56.760 phenomenal book. In the book, there's this passage and I 0:22:57.240 --> 0:23:00.439 I am very the person that wrote in your you're right, 0:23:00.560 --> 0:23:03.360 I'm very familiar with the passage. And in this passage 0:23:03.400 --> 0:23:07.040 she says, basically in Shadows on the Koyakuk, a big 0:23:07.119 --> 0:23:12.040 part of the book is that this boy and his 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:14.600 siblings like their their mom dies and they just they're 0:23:14.640 --> 0:23:16.920 just like left out in this cabin. It's a true story. 0:23:18.160 --> 0:23:19.920 That's a big part of his life stories is trying 0:23:19.960 --> 0:23:23.600 to like keep his little siblings alive without parental help. 0:23:24.560 --> 0:23:26.800 And he says, supper that night was rice and fish 0:23:27.160 --> 0:23:30.720 we had caught the day before. He saw about the 0:23:31.720 --> 0:23:34.560 night his mom died. Supper that night was rice and 0:23:34.680 --> 0:23:38.359 fish we had caught the day before. Whitefish have a hard, 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:42.280 gristly part in their gut that looks af it as 0:23:42.359 --> 0:23:46.080 if it has tentacles all over it, which is a 0:23:46.119 --> 0:23:50.440 favorite delicacy of Koya Khan Indians. Mom fried and ate 0:23:50.520 --> 0:23:55.000 this part. He says that whitefish got killed my mother. 0:23:57.040 --> 0:23:59.000 Mom called us into the cabin and told us she 0:23:59.119 --> 0:24:01.520 wasn't feeling well. Go upstairs and go to bed, she said. 0:24:02.600 --> 0:24:05.000 We found our mother lying at the bottom of the stairs, 0:24:05.080 --> 0:24:07.080 half out the door, as she had been when we 0:24:07.160 --> 0:24:09.359 had gone to bed. Her eyes were closed, most of 0:24:09.400 --> 0:24:12.600 her tongue protruded from her mouth, and it was bitten 0:24:12.600 --> 0:24:16.680 almost in two. The author this is the guy that 0:24:16.720 --> 0:24:20.200 wrote the letter in matt continuing. The author doesn't elaborate 0:24:20.280 --> 0:24:22.399 any further on how the hard gristly part in the 0:24:22.440 --> 0:24:27.520 Whitefish's got killed his mother. Google searches have failed to 0:24:27.560 --> 0:24:31.280 shed any light on the mechanism of death. He's wondered, 0:24:31.320 --> 0:24:36.320 you got any thoughts about that. I don't think. I 0:24:36.480 --> 0:24:38.680 wasn't there, but I remember reading it. I don't think 0:24:38.720 --> 0:24:41.159 that that's what his mom died from when she bit 0:24:41.240 --> 0:24:43.400 her tongue. Wouldn't it be that she had a seizure, 0:24:46.160 --> 0:24:47.640 possibly bitter tongue in half? 0:24:47.920 --> 0:24:52.160 Yeah, although you don't know what triggered that. No, Yeah, 0:24:52.200 --> 0:24:53.560 I didn't. 0:24:54.240 --> 0:24:55.320 I felt it was coincidence. 0:24:55.480 --> 0:24:58.280 I did my own five minutes of googling, and I 0:24:58.440 --> 0:25:00.520 found the part of the stomach that looks like that, 0:25:00.800 --> 0:25:02.520 and I a lot of fish have it, and I 0:25:02.640 --> 0:25:06.600 found uh, I actually found a cookbook of of like 0:25:06.720 --> 0:25:09.040 traditional Tommy min, does it take you to do all this? Oh? 0:25:09.760 --> 0:25:10.360 Five to ten? 0:25:10.560 --> 0:25:10.760 Sure? 0:25:10.800 --> 0:25:12.639 Not lying pretty good with computers? 0:25:13.160 --> 0:25:16.640 Five it just double Do you know what's that film? 0:25:17.119 --> 0:25:17.320 Well? 0:25:17.440 --> 0:25:19.400 I thought you were started to call them out and jump. 0:25:19.560 --> 0:25:21.200 I thought you were so impressed by the depth of 0:25:21.240 --> 0:25:23.960 my research that I thought five seem unrealistic. I really 0:25:24.000 --> 0:25:25.720 don't know how much time I spent on this. It 0:25:25.840 --> 0:25:27.680 was in the hazy, it was in like the first 0:25:27.720 --> 0:25:29.800 cup of coffee stages my morning on. 0:25:31.720 --> 0:25:32.960 It without without bragging. 0:25:33.040 --> 0:25:36.920 I actually found it without bragging. For sure, sure there 0:25:37.040 --> 0:25:43.280 exists available online to any Internet researcher a book of 0:25:43.400 --> 0:25:49.760 traditional coya con recipes. When there's pages and pages about 0:25:50.520 --> 0:25:52.480 how to prep whitefish, and there's been a couple of 0:25:52.520 --> 0:25:56.320 hours going through that. Yeah, I scanned through it. Uh 0:25:56.760 --> 0:25:59.320 I scanned through it poorly, because I'm not bragging. I 0:25:59.440 --> 0:25:59.959 scanned through. 0:26:00.560 --> 0:26:03.440 I scan through it haphazardly and ply meg yourself now, 0:26:03.600 --> 0:26:03.879 But I. 0:26:04.880 --> 0:26:08.600 Was unable to find anything. Surely a more a talented 0:26:08.680 --> 0:26:11.840 researcher could have found the answer but I was unable. 0:26:12.000 --> 0:26:15.119 But you found the recipe I did, Yeah, and you 0:26:15.240 --> 0:26:19.080 found no reason. You found no reason like that they hate. 0:26:19.200 --> 0:26:20.960 It's like, you know, what's that what's that fish liver 0:26:21.080 --> 0:26:21.879 that is toxic? 0:26:22.000 --> 0:26:22.760 You found no thing? 0:26:22.840 --> 0:26:23.600 Like, hey, be careful. 0:26:24.200 --> 0:26:26.760 No, I couldn't find anything like that, but that I 0:26:26.840 --> 0:26:30.360 couldn't have found anything anyway, just because of how bad 0:26:30.400 --> 0:26:31.200 I am and that stuff. 0:26:32.480 --> 0:26:34.879 So it doesn't really say it doesn't mean yeah, no, I. 0:26:34.880 --> 0:26:37.040 Think someone else should probably back me up. 0:26:37.080 --> 0:26:38.520 Ye, I don't even know why we're trusting a single 0:26:38.560 --> 0:26:38.960 thing you said. 0:26:39.800 --> 0:26:41.000 I missed it on the first time. 0:26:42.240 --> 0:26:46.000 Yeah. I always read that and like, again, I can't 0:26:46.040 --> 0:26:47.040 recommend that book enough. 0:26:47.359 --> 0:26:49.560 You could have read that book a long time ago. 0:26:52.840 --> 0:26:55.160 I read that and wondered about that. I just feel 0:26:55.200 --> 0:26:57.080 like it's like I hate, I would never want to 0:26:57.160 --> 0:27:03.840 argue with the brother, but I think something else happened. 0:27:03.960 --> 0:27:06.240 Yeah, there's just like it's hard to make a one 0:27:06.280 --> 0:27:07.280 to one connection there. 0:27:09.520 --> 0:27:12.080 Yeah, think about when you get real sick from eating, 0:27:13.440 --> 0:27:17.000 like your mind will kind of find culprits. Oh yeah, 0:27:17.320 --> 0:27:19.880 you know, I remember one time I got super sick 0:27:19.920 --> 0:27:23.040 in Mexico, like like deathly ill, and I couldn't eat 0:27:23.080 --> 0:27:27.280 avocados forever. But I had a ham in avocado. We 0:27:27.400 --> 0:27:32.680 bought like some some room temp air dried ham and 0:27:32.800 --> 0:27:38.399 avocado and bread. I got deathly ill. It wasn't an avocado. 0:27:38.600 --> 0:27:40.919 Yeah yeah, but a. 0:27:40.960 --> 0:27:43.280 Week later I could have had a big old ham sandwich, 0:27:43.359 --> 0:27:46.320 but avocado. I couldn't go near an avocado for two years. 0:27:46.359 --> 0:27:48.359 So I feel like stuff stands out in your mind. 0:27:48.440 --> 0:27:49.120 Yeah, oh sure. 0:27:49.240 --> 0:27:52.120 And you're looking at this crazy octopus tentacle when you're 0:27:52.119 --> 0:27:53.879 a kid. Yeah, you're looking at that, and you're like, 0:27:53.960 --> 0:27:56.560 good Lord, and then like you know, haven't for bid 0:27:56.680 --> 0:27:58.639 like your mad dies the next day, like it's gotta 0:27:58.680 --> 0:27:59.560 be that stoch. 0:28:00.840 --> 0:28:04.400 Yeah, she says she wasn't feeling well. It probably could 0:28:04.400 --> 0:28:05.920 have not mattered what she had for dinner. 0:28:06.040 --> 0:28:10.520 Yeah, all right, So we're gonna talk about we're gonna 0:28:10.560 --> 0:28:14.040 dig in and explain a We're gonna dig in and 0:28:14.119 --> 0:28:19.399 explain a really fascinating period of American history. And Randall 0:28:19.400 --> 0:28:22.320 and I have done he's in the past. Uh, we 0:28:22.440 --> 0:28:24.720 did one on Daniel Boone and The Long Hunters. We 0:28:24.800 --> 0:28:27.080 did one of these episodes on Daniel Boone The Long Hunters. 0:28:27.600 --> 0:28:32.600 We did one of these episodes on the Mountain Men, 0:28:33.280 --> 0:28:36.920 so Jim Bridger, John Colter and the Mountain Men, and 0:28:37.080 --> 0:28:39.040 we're gonna do one right now on sort of the 0:28:39.200 --> 0:28:47.120 era that the era, the Backwoodsman era that came after 0:28:47.600 --> 0:28:50.440 the really big hit that came after the mountain Man era, 0:28:50.920 --> 0:28:56.080 which was the hide Hunters. So to start, Ranald's gonna 0:28:56.120 --> 0:29:00.120 lay out a little bit about like he's gonna why 0:29:00.120 --> 0:29:02.200 are we talking about those three things? Like why are 0:29:02.280 --> 0:29:05.600 we bucketing those three things? What makes them similar, what 0:29:05.680 --> 0:29:06.480 makes them distinct? 0:29:08.240 --> 0:29:11.240 Yeah, So these are the first three installments of this 0:29:11.640 --> 0:29:16.400 Meat Eaters American History series, and what we've focused on 0:29:16.520 --> 0:29:20.640 in that series are these eras of sort of frontier 0:29:20.760 --> 0:29:26.400 market hunting where large groups of individuals are going out well, 0:29:26.400 --> 0:29:29.320 I should say relatively large groups of individuals are seeking 0:29:29.400 --> 0:29:33.920 sort of a new life by harvesting wildlife resources for profit. 0:29:34.200 --> 0:29:37.480 And that's a phenomenon you see repeated over and over 0:29:37.480 --> 0:29:40.480 again in American history and often aligns with sort of 0:29:40.520 --> 0:29:45.280 bigger shifts in the larger national story, like the Mountain 0:29:45.320 --> 0:29:47.840 Man aligns with the Louisiana Purchase and the opening up 0:29:47.880 --> 0:29:52.040 of the Rocky Mountain West. The long Hunter era, which 0:29:52.360 --> 0:29:56.040 is in the late seventeen sixties early seventeen seventies. That 0:29:56.160 --> 0:30:00.600 aligns with this window of opportunity between the French and 0:30:00.680 --> 0:30:06.240 Indian War and the American Revolution broadly speaking. But in 0:30:06.360 --> 0:30:11.320 each of these instances, there's there are these individuals that 0:30:11.480 --> 0:30:17.200 go out into what is then land largely unknown to 0:30:17.320 --> 0:30:22.040 them and occupied by Native people, and they're harvesting wildlife 0:30:22.120 --> 0:30:26.000 resources on the scale that's sort of unimaginable to us today, 0:30:26.960 --> 0:30:29.560 and in doing so, they also leave behind some of 0:30:29.680 --> 0:30:36.000 our most told and retold stories of wilderness living and 0:30:36.080 --> 0:30:40.520 outdoor adventure that have sort of, you know, been passed 0:30:40.560 --> 0:30:43.440 down to us as as like the origin story of 0:30:43.600 --> 0:30:47.720 like American hunters and anglers, right, But in this series, 0:30:47.800 --> 0:30:51.760 we're asking what were they doing really, like, what were 0:30:51.800 --> 0:30:54.640 they after? How are they acquiring it, who were they 0:30:54.720 --> 0:30:57.320 selling it to, what was it being used for? And 0:30:57.520 --> 0:31:02.880 what are the various like larger contextual factors that shaped 0:31:03.440 --> 0:31:06.320 how they lived the lives the way they did so. 0:31:07.920 --> 0:31:09.560 Like I said, the first one was the long Hunters, 0:31:09.760 --> 0:31:11.800 and Daniel Boone is the most well known of those. 0:31:12.600 --> 0:31:17.120 These are guys largely coming out of western North Carolina, 0:31:17.720 --> 0:31:21.760 western Virginia, and they're going across the Appalachian Mountains to 0:31:21.840 --> 0:31:25.880 shoot white tailed deer for their skin, which is used 0:31:25.960 --> 0:31:32.200 in leather goods primarily manufactured in Britain breeches, but all 0:31:32.280 --> 0:31:34.760 sorts of other and breeches are like knee length pants, 0:31:34.840 --> 0:31:37.400 like the goofy things you see on paintings of old 0:31:37.440 --> 0:31:39.800 guys with big white wigs. Yeah, yeah, when you see it. 0:31:40.040 --> 0:31:41.920 If you see like an old guy or like or 0:31:42.280 --> 0:31:45.480 Napoleon or someone, he's got like some white pants, some tidy, 0:31:45.640 --> 0:31:46.840 some type in white pants. 0:31:46.880 --> 0:31:48.960 Buttons on the front might be buckskins, like a little 0:31:49.000 --> 0:31:49.920 button fly flap. 0:31:50.080 --> 0:31:51.440 Yeah, it could be American buckskin. 0:31:51.600 --> 0:31:56.360 Yeah, and so yeah, these are essentially poor farmers living 0:31:56.440 --> 0:31:59.520 on the frontier, and it's an economy where they don't 0:31:59.520 --> 0:32:02.040 have ready access for cash but one thing, and their 0:32:02.440 --> 0:32:05.040 farms don't produce enough of a surplus to really sell 0:32:05.120 --> 0:32:07.800 on a market. But the one good that they can 0:32:07.960 --> 0:32:10.160 take to market and sell to buy the things that 0:32:10.200 --> 0:32:13.000 they need to buy is white tailed deer skin. So 0:32:14.040 --> 0:32:16.080 after the French and Indian War, when it's a little 0:32:16.120 --> 0:32:19.160 bit safer to go across the Appalachian Mountains, they start 0:32:19.200 --> 0:32:23.280 going over to Kentucky, Tennessee. Basically the Ohio River Valley 0:32:23.320 --> 0:32:27.360 in the Cumberland River Valley and shoot deer by the 0:32:27.480 --> 0:32:30.800 hundreds and thousands and pack them by mule train across 0:32:30.840 --> 0:32:36.360 the mountains. And they stay out there for months, sometimes 0:32:36.640 --> 0:32:40.280 a year longer. And that's how they get the name 0:32:40.680 --> 0:32:45.000 long hunters long ass hunt. Long ass hunt refers to 0:32:45.040 --> 0:32:48.400 the duration of their trips. And these are sort of 0:32:49.560 --> 0:32:55.120 smaller groups. Oftentimes it's like family members, neighbors, and they 0:32:55.920 --> 0:33:00.360 organize their expeditions along these lines of kinship and sort 0:33:00.400 --> 0:33:05.160 of clan, you know. And and it's it's a really 0:33:05.240 --> 0:33:09.560 interesting sort of fleeting moment because in seventeen seventy five 0:33:09.680 --> 0:33:13.080 the first permanent white settlement is established in Kentucky. And 0:33:13.160 --> 0:33:15.520 then also you have the beginnings of some of the 0:33:15.600 --> 0:33:23.120 frontier violence that ultimately bleeds into the Revolutionary War. So 0:33:23.240 --> 0:33:24.360 that's the long hunters. Yep. 0:33:24.960 --> 0:33:29.040 That's a that's a interesting thing that we compare through 0:33:29.120 --> 0:33:31.880 all these is these like what are the the groups, 0:33:32.880 --> 0:33:37.040 the group dynamics, And you you made a point with 0:33:37.080 --> 0:33:39.560 the long hunters. When you're reading about long hunter expeditions, 0:33:41.440 --> 0:33:47.000 it's tons of brother in laws, Yeah, tons of cousins, tons, 0:33:47.040 --> 0:33:47.520 you know what I mean. 0:33:47.640 --> 0:33:50.440 Brother's father in law's brother in law. This guy married 0:33:50.480 --> 0:33:51.400 this guy's sister. 0:33:51.440 --> 0:33:57.840 Exactly, and he's like sort of like these familial, very 0:33:58.000 --> 0:34:02.360 neighborly clan. Yeah, but it could be as many as 0:34:02.440 --> 0:34:04.040 forty people, and. 0:34:04.080 --> 0:34:06.800 They're And one of the big differences too, between the 0:34:06.880 --> 0:34:10.040 Long Hunters and some of the later volumes. The individuals 0:34:10.080 --> 0:34:11.600 we look at in the later volumes is they don't 0:34:11.680 --> 0:34:14.160 leave behind a lot of records. They're they're rural people, 0:34:14.239 --> 0:34:18.440 they're largely illiterate. Most of their stories that we have 0:34:18.680 --> 0:34:22.080 of them are recorded after the fact by interviews with 0:34:22.239 --> 0:34:26.040 their survivors or maybe interviews with them later in life, 0:34:27.120 --> 0:34:28.840 you know, like talking to an old man about what 0:34:28.920 --> 0:34:31.680 he did in his twenties. And so the source material 0:34:31.760 --> 0:34:34.960 for that, with the exception of Daniel Boone, is very 0:34:36.200 --> 0:34:38.279 very thin. So we had to do a lot more 0:34:39.800 --> 0:34:44.239 sort of piecing together and hypothesizing in that story than 0:34:44.280 --> 0:34:45.560 we did in some of these other ones. 0:34:45.680 --> 0:34:48.759 Yep, okay, recap mountain men. Like when you hear the 0:34:48.760 --> 0:34:53.600 word mountain men, it's an abused term, it is it 0:34:54.120 --> 0:35:00.279 means like, yeah, it's not like an old her that 0:35:00.320 --> 0:35:01.840 lives up in the mountains, and there's like when you 0:35:01.920 --> 0:35:06.320 see mountain men from a historical standpoint, it's something very specific. 0:35:07.239 --> 0:35:11.200 Yeah, So as we use the term in most I 0:35:11.239 --> 0:35:13.920 guess people who are in this field use the term, 0:35:13.960 --> 0:35:18.720 it's referring to Rocky mountain beaver trappers who went west 0:35:19.120 --> 0:35:23.360 after the return of Lewis and Clark. So it's eighteen 0:35:23.400 --> 0:35:28.399 oh six, it really is sort of becomes a big 0:35:28.520 --> 0:35:31.440 thing in the late eighteen twenties, mid eighteen twenties, late 0:35:31.480 --> 0:35:34.000 eighteen twenties when they developed the rendezvous system, which is 0:35:34.040 --> 0:35:37.319 a way of supplying these trappers and also getting their 0:35:37.400 --> 0:35:40.239 furs to market. But they're they're out there in the 0:35:40.400 --> 0:35:46.360 Rockies sort of nomadically traveling from watershed to watershed in 0:35:47.120 --> 0:35:53.239 organized groups, trapping beaver, which is being used to produce wolfeldt. 0:35:54.040 --> 0:35:56.399 So really they're not after the skin. They're after the hare, 0:35:56.480 --> 0:35:58.919 which is and the hair not attached to the skin, 0:35:59.000 --> 0:36:01.520 which is sort of a an interesting twist when you 0:36:01.600 --> 0:36:05.440 think about like the fur trade in general, it's like 0:36:05.600 --> 0:36:08.800 you're making mink eyelashes, like mink eyelashes exactly. I was 0:36:08.840 --> 0:36:10.759 curious when we were talking about that if they're keeping 0:36:11.160 --> 0:36:12.680 if they're just gluing them in place. 0:36:12.520 --> 0:36:13.839 On some they're just plucking them. 0:36:13.840 --> 0:36:15.359 There's no way they're putting Let I think be cool 0:36:15.360 --> 0:36:15.799 if you have you. 0:36:15.840 --> 0:36:17.719 Had the letter on there, you have all the yeah, 0:36:17.760 --> 0:36:18.560 but the underfur. 0:36:19.160 --> 0:36:19.359 Yeah. 0:36:20.280 --> 0:36:22.080 Oh you know what we fail to mention? What's that? 0:36:23.000 --> 0:36:27.680 Met Eater's American History, The Hide Hunters. So volume three, yes, 0:36:28.040 --> 0:36:28.640 is out now. 0:36:29.360 --> 0:36:34.160 Out now out October fourteenth. This is being released October thirteenth. 0:36:34.280 --> 0:36:36.080 So unless you're the type of person that listens to 0:36:36.160 --> 0:36:38.880 it the day it drops as you listen to it, 0:36:38.920 --> 0:36:39.440 it's out now. 0:36:39.600 --> 0:36:42.520 So met Eater's American History The Hide Hunters, which we're 0:36:42.560 --> 0:36:44.800 giving you a we're giving you a crash course in 0:36:44.880 --> 0:36:46.880 the subject right now. We're giving you a free crash 0:36:47.000 --> 0:36:49.440 course in the subject right now for an hour, little tease, 0:36:49.600 --> 0:36:53.719 but then the actual thing is how many hours? Seven Yeah, 0:36:54.040 --> 0:36:56.399 so you're getting a little you're getting a little little 0:36:56.480 --> 0:37:00.759 tittle later right now. But then the big helping, the 0:37:00.960 --> 0:37:05.880 big Christmas Goose with all the trimmings, with all the 0:37:06.000 --> 0:37:12.080 trimming is out now seven hours anywhere you get. 0:37:12.000 --> 0:37:16.239 Your audio books, where you get your audiobooks. So, yeah, 0:37:16.320 --> 0:37:19.080 Mountain Men is is a story that I think a 0:37:19.120 --> 0:37:21.400 lot of people might be familiar with just when they 0:37:21.480 --> 0:37:25.640 think of a frontiersman trapper. But one of the interesting 0:37:25.680 --> 0:37:29.880 differences between mountain men and long hunters is that, uh, 0:37:29.960 --> 0:37:33.480 these expeditions because they're going across the continent and there's 0:37:33.520 --> 0:37:38.120 a ton of logistics involved, they're they're actually organized by corporations, 0:37:38.920 --> 0:37:41.239 and they have a lot of capital, and there's a 0:37:41.320 --> 0:37:45.120 lot of sort of behind the scenes jockeying for control 0:37:45.200 --> 0:37:48.200 of different corporations and so and so sells their interest whatever. 0:37:48.320 --> 0:37:54.040 But out of that you get the fact that these 0:37:55.080 --> 0:37:57.080 these trappers, a lot of them just see an ad 0:37:57.160 --> 0:37:59.520 in a newspaper. It's like, do you want to go 0:37:59.600 --> 0:38:02.480 west and trap beaver for two years? Three years? And 0:38:02.560 --> 0:38:02.960 sign on? 0:38:03.120 --> 0:38:04.440 And so like. 0:38:04.600 --> 0:38:07.680 While Daniel Boone and some of these long hunters were 0:38:07.680 --> 0:38:12.000 going and hunting with their family and their neighbors, guys 0:38:12.080 --> 0:38:14.319 like Jim Bridger were sort of you know, he's he's 0:38:14.400 --> 0:38:17.000 eighteen years old, and he's doesn't have a lot of 0:38:17.719 --> 0:38:20.440 he's sort of rootless. His parents are dead, and he 0:38:20.520 --> 0:38:22.600 sees an ad in the newspaper and shows up at 0:38:22.640 --> 0:38:23.960 an office in Saint Louis and. 0:38:24.280 --> 0:38:27.880 Signs, yes, signs an employment agreement. Yeah, that's the funniest 0:38:27.880 --> 0:38:29.399 thing you think about. When you think about these guys, 0:38:29.600 --> 0:38:32.040 like the mountain men that are out there living off 0:38:32.080 --> 0:38:36.319 the land for multiple years with very little resupply. Most 0:38:36.320 --> 0:38:38.799 of those guys start out it's like it's a job. 0:38:39.239 --> 0:38:42.640 Yeah, and it has a pay scale and you commit, 0:38:43.640 --> 0:38:47.080 it's financial security, like there's. 0:38:46.280 --> 0:38:48.360 Not like an HR office. But I mean it's like 0:38:48.400 --> 0:38:49.839 a job though, right. 0:38:49.800 --> 0:38:53.280 Yeah, yeah, and like the I mean, it's it's interesting 0:38:53.280 --> 0:38:56.080 because whenever you read a story about like the Rocky 0:38:56.120 --> 0:38:59.040 Mountain Fur Company, they always mentioned this one really famous 0:38:59.760 --> 0:39:03.680 at advertisement where they're seeking one hundred enterprising young men 0:39:03.840 --> 0:39:07.160 to go up the Missouri and so yeah, although it 0:39:07.239 --> 0:39:12.560 seems like this really distant, sort of ancient world, they're 0:39:12.840 --> 0:39:16.279 finding job ads in the newspaper and following up on 0:39:16.400 --> 0:39:20.680 them to become a trapper. And then that story dies 0:39:20.719 --> 0:39:25.320 out really with the virtual extirpation of beaver from the Rockies, 0:39:25.600 --> 0:39:28.320 and at the same time there's a collapse in the 0:39:28.880 --> 0:39:32.000 beaver felt market. There's a bunch of different reasons for that, 0:39:32.160 --> 0:39:35.719 but the silk top hat becomes the preferred fashion and 0:39:38.320 --> 0:39:44.320 essentially the beaver trade sort of vanishes, and in the 0:39:44.400 --> 0:39:47.080 eighteen thirty eight eighteen thirty nine, when these guys are 0:39:47.120 --> 0:39:49.399 coming together for rendezvous to sell their furs, they sort 0:39:49.400 --> 0:39:51.640 of see the writing on the wall. And then eighteen 0:39:51.719 --> 0:39:56.400 forty is the last official rendezvous where which is like 0:39:56.480 --> 0:39:59.319 the big commercial exchange that sort of keeps this whole 0:39:59.400 --> 0:40:01.000 world turning. 0:40:01.760 --> 0:40:03.759 When when Randall's talking about for hats, like, if you 0:40:03.840 --> 0:40:09.280 imagine honest Abe Lincoln, so honest Ave Lincoln is running 0:40:09.280 --> 0:40:14.040 around in that hat eighteen sixty, if he was running 0:40:14.040 --> 0:40:17.840 around in that hat in eighteen thirty, his would have 0:40:17.880 --> 0:40:21.240 been wool felt, beaver wolf felt. But I believe honest 0:40:21.280 --> 0:40:23.800 Abe was wearing was by Civil War, was wearing a 0:40:23.880 --> 0:40:26.239 silk hat. I think it was a silk hat, same cut, 0:40:26.520 --> 0:40:28.160 like those crazy looking hats. 0:40:28.360 --> 0:40:31.680 Yeah, you keep like a house cat up inside there, 0:40:32.880 --> 0:40:36.080 but it seems like a very inefficient. Oh just an 0:40:36.120 --> 0:40:38.560 insane when you're wearing a backpack and it catches on 0:40:38.680 --> 0:40:40.879 everything over your head and you just go, oh shit, 0:40:40.920 --> 0:40:41.840 I'm wearing my backpack. 0:40:41.920 --> 0:40:42.120 Noyea. 0:40:42.200 --> 0:40:44.000 You know, I would imagine that a guy with the 0:40:44.040 --> 0:40:45.480 top hat would have a similar issue. 0:40:45.560 --> 0:40:47.200 Yeah, it's like a guy trying to wear a cowboy 0:40:47.239 --> 0:40:48.359 hat on an airplane. 0:40:48.120 --> 0:40:50.560 Especially a tall guy like a Blincoln, you know, better 0:40:50.640 --> 0:40:52.680 have high door door openings. 0:40:57.480 --> 0:40:59.719 Where are we at? Yeah, we'll talk about that. Yeah, 0:41:00.760 --> 0:41:06.719 which moves us into the hide Hunter era. Okay, here's 0:41:06.840 --> 0:41:09.320 one of the funny things about working on these series 0:41:09.760 --> 0:41:14.400 of all these these American commercial hunter market hunter periods. 0:41:15.200 --> 0:41:20.760 For the first couple of volumes we did the Long Hunters, 0:41:21.640 --> 0:41:25.359 the Mountain Men. You have all these American heroes, these 0:41:25.480 --> 0:41:31.600 mythologized characters. And what's interesting about these American heroes, these 0:41:31.680 --> 0:41:36.480 mythologized characters is there's more awareness. There's more awareness about 0:41:36.520 --> 0:41:40.040 the individuals and the lives they lived. Then there is 0:41:40.160 --> 0:41:43.840 awareness about what they actually were doing for a living, 0:41:44.640 --> 0:41:47.920 meaning people know the name Daniel Boone. Okay, So if 0:41:47.960 --> 0:41:51.080 you went out and just took it, just pulled random 0:41:51.640 --> 0:41:55.279 adult Americans off the street and said, have you ever 0:41:55.320 --> 0:41:57.839 heard of Daniel Boone? You're gonna get a nod. Yes, 0:42:00.160 --> 0:42:01.880 what was up with him? Some kind of hunter or 0:42:01.920 --> 0:42:02.840 some kind of frontiersman? 0:42:02.880 --> 0:42:03.720 What I lived in the woods? 0:42:03.840 --> 0:42:06.080 Yeah, But if I said, can you explain me what 0:42:06.239 --> 0:42:08.160 he did for a living, You're gonna have a very 0:42:08.239 --> 0:42:11.120 low success rate on getting a good answer. So people 0:42:11.280 --> 0:42:14.720 know the name, they know these pioneers, this pioneering figure, 0:42:14.800 --> 0:42:18.359 but they're not clear on what he was doing. He's 0:42:18.520 --> 0:42:22.719 known for people have an understanding that he was a 0:42:22.840 --> 0:42:27.400 sort of explorer settler, which he was, but not necessarily 0:42:27.480 --> 0:42:31.200 intentionally being like he wasn't like like, he wasn't a promoter. 0:42:34.080 --> 0:42:37.880 He is very tightly affiliated with people know him as 0:42:37.920 --> 0:42:42.680 a Kentucky figure. He left Kentucky, died elsewhere, right, there's 0:42:42.719 --> 0:42:44.279 not a lot of awareness of what he was. Same 0:42:44.320 --> 0:42:47.240 with if I went to you and said Davy Crockett, 0:42:47.480 --> 0:42:49.359 people are gonna be like, yes, familiar with the name 0:42:49.480 --> 0:42:51.480 Davy Crockett, And I said, can you explain to me 0:42:51.560 --> 0:42:53.480 some of the things Davy Crockett did for a living, 0:42:53.480 --> 0:42:55.680 and they probably wouldn't have a very good sense. The 0:42:55.760 --> 0:43:00.880 Mountain Man era, people know Jim Bridger explorer or whatever. 0:43:01.000 --> 0:43:04.719 But if I said, but why was he exploring? They 0:43:04.840 --> 0:43:08.080 might not know that his sole focus over much of 0:43:08.160 --> 0:43:11.719 his professional career, his sole focus was like trying to 0:43:11.800 --> 0:43:16.440 locate populations of beavers in order to trap them. But 0:43:17.000 --> 0:43:21.359 they stand as these American icons are American heroes. Now 0:43:21.440 --> 0:43:23.879 that we're moving into the hide hunter era, and when 0:43:23.880 --> 0:43:27.360 we say the hide Hunters we're talking about is buffalo hunters, 0:43:27.400 --> 0:43:31.640 but there's a long history of being buffalo hunters. When 0:43:31.640 --> 0:43:33.200 we talk about the hide hunters, we're talking about a 0:43:33.280 --> 0:43:35.800 very specific type of buffalo hunters. We're talking about a 0:43:35.840 --> 0:43:40.600 type of buffalo hunter who was hunting buffalo in order 0:43:40.680 --> 0:43:43.400 to get the skins which were just sold as dried 0:43:43.680 --> 0:43:47.840 what they call flint hides, not tanned. They were collecting skins, 0:43:48.000 --> 0:43:50.080 pegging them out to dry and selling them, and these 0:43:50.120 --> 0:43:54.440 were skins that were being tanned into leather products in 0:43:54.520 --> 0:43:57.759 the East. That is what we call a hide hunter 0:43:57.840 --> 0:44:02.520 is someone who's using like a systematic system of slaughter 0:44:02.719 --> 0:44:09.080 of buffalo in order to sell hides in a specific 0:44:09.120 --> 0:44:12.160 period of time. One of the things that struck me 0:44:12.200 --> 0:44:15.040 the most we started on this highe hunter period is 0:44:15.080 --> 0:44:18.320 that here you're now entering into a type of a 0:44:18.440 --> 0:44:22.279 type of frontiersman, a type of market hunter from an 0:44:22.320 --> 0:44:26.000 era that produced zero heroes. Rhymes. 0:44:27.440 --> 0:44:28.840 Well, if I left the s off, it would have 0:44:29.000 --> 0:44:29.960 put it in the dog song. 0:44:33.520 --> 0:44:38.320 There's no heroes, like, there's no mythologized figure. And you 0:44:38.400 --> 0:44:42.080 can ask you why are there no famous heroic hide hunters? 0:44:42.120 --> 0:44:45.799 And I think that there's probably one main reason why 0:44:48.520 --> 0:44:52.960 while the long hunters like Boone extra pated deer from 0:44:53.080 --> 0:44:58.120 certain areas or greatly reduced deer herds wiped out elk herds, 0:44:58.840 --> 0:45:03.520 wiped out buffalo, they're not known as the guys that 0:45:03.680 --> 0:45:09.440 did that. That crime hasn't been pegged on them. The 0:45:09.560 --> 0:45:14.000 mountain men Jim Bridger, they extra pated beavers across a 0:45:14.080 --> 0:45:17.720 bunch of their range. They wiped out regional populations of beavers, 0:45:17.840 --> 0:45:20.080 but the crime hasn't been pinned on them. 0:45:20.760 --> 0:45:22.560 And a lot of people probably don't even know there 0:45:22.680 --> 0:45:23.480 was a crime. Yep. 0:45:23.600 --> 0:45:26.440 They probably don't know that those things happen. Yeah, but 0:45:26.560 --> 0:45:29.960 when you get into the buffalo hide hunters who as 0:45:30.040 --> 0:45:32.400 will explain the years who from the end of the 0:45:32.480 --> 0:45:37.440 Civil War to about eighteen eighty three, they virtually eliminate 0:45:38.360 --> 0:45:44.400 They kill about fifteen million buffalo. They kill them until 0:45:44.640 --> 0:45:47.560 there's less than one thousand left in the United States. 0:45:49.320 --> 0:45:53.960 It is very well understood that they committed the crime and. 0:45:54.040 --> 0:45:57.600 Were still living with that consequence. That consequence today, Like 0:45:57.960 --> 0:46:01.600 even though they didn't wipe out the buffo, biologically speaking, 0:46:02.480 --> 0:46:06.840 the buffalo never recovered from that episode as a wild animal. 0:46:07.120 --> 0:46:09.680 Yeah. The way the best way I've heard that that 0:46:09.920 --> 0:46:15.239 distinction explained as I remember years ago someone explaining that 0:46:16.239 --> 0:46:20.480 they weren't driven to genetic extinction, but they were driven 0:46:20.560 --> 0:46:25.480 to ecological extinction, meaning they cease to be they cease 0:46:25.560 --> 0:46:30.000 to have an ecological artage landscape. Yeah, and we understand 0:46:30.360 --> 0:46:34.120 that these Buffalo Hunters did that, and it's and that 0:46:34.360 --> 0:46:36.959 crime has been pinned on them. And when you watch 0:46:37.040 --> 0:46:42.680 a documentary that deals with this era, they're usually just 0:46:42.880 --> 0:46:47.040 treated as villains. They're the villains. Everyone agrees that they're 0:46:47.080 --> 0:46:50.919 the villains. We don't have buffalo Hunter heroes. We don't 0:46:51.000 --> 0:46:54.720 make Buffalo Hunter movies. There aren't movies where the buffalo 0:46:54.840 --> 0:47:01.279 Hunter winds up being heroic and saving everybody, right, And 0:47:01.440 --> 0:47:05.160 Jeremiah Johnson, he doesn't run into and get saved by 0:47:05.239 --> 0:47:09.600 a buffalo Hunter because they're villains. Yeah, he gets saved 0:47:09.640 --> 0:47:12.080 by an old mountain man because they're heroes. 0:47:12.800 --> 0:47:16.480 They and the other thing too that we get into 0:47:16.520 --> 0:47:22.680 this in the audiobook is that there's a shift in 0:47:22.920 --> 0:47:27.120 consciousness that occurs during their lifetime where all of a 0:47:27.160 --> 0:47:31.200 sudden you see the rise of the modern conservation movement, 0:47:31.440 --> 0:47:34.920 the founding of the Boone and Crocket Club, the curtailment 0:47:35.000 --> 0:47:39.160 of market hunting by the federal government. And this all 0:47:39.239 --> 0:47:43.080 happens during their lifetimes sort of almost as soon as 0:47:43.160 --> 0:47:46.720 the smoke is cleared from their shooting, all of a sudden, 0:47:46.800 --> 0:47:50.600 market hunting is a very bad thing in sort of 0:47:50.640 --> 0:47:54.719 the cultural and political American consciousness, and so they sort 0:47:54.760 --> 0:47:59.400 of live in this weird space where the world that 0:47:59.520 --> 0:48:03.880 they did these acts in and killed all these buffalo 0:48:04.960 --> 0:48:07.480 was not the world that they lived in twenty years later. 0:48:10.600 --> 0:48:15.320 Randall that we're gonna touch on this today. I'm just 0:48:15.400 --> 0:48:17.080 gonna touch out now. I think we're gonna touch on 0:48:17.120 --> 0:48:22.200 this today. Yeah, here's the thing about to keep in 0:48:22.200 --> 0:48:24.839 mind about this hide hunter thing. And we're gonna talk 0:48:24.880 --> 0:48:28.279 about why the years. Well, you don't talk about le's 0:48:28.320 --> 0:48:30.239 let's do why the years now, because I want to 0:48:30.280 --> 0:48:35.000 talk about the way in which this era, Yeah, the 0:48:35.080 --> 0:48:39.040 way in which this era turns into the modern era. 0:48:40.640 --> 0:48:40.799 Hm. 0:48:41.360 --> 0:48:43.520 You know, we'll get into this more, but we make 0:48:43.560 --> 0:48:45.680 the point in there that these some of these buffalo 0:48:45.800 --> 0:48:55.200 hide hunters lived to see the publication of San County Almanac, right, 0:48:55.719 --> 0:49:02.800 They live to see the presidency of an individual Theodore Roosevelt, 0:49:03.480 --> 0:49:07.400 who was like an adversary of the market hunters. 0:49:08.600 --> 0:49:10.600 Yeah, one of them eliminated. 0:49:10.800 --> 0:49:14.359 Yeah, so they were like living a period of sort 0:49:14.400 --> 0:49:18.879 of watching their peers, watching their contemporaries come to condemn them, 0:49:20.120 --> 0:49:21.920 you know, I mean you were making that point, but 0:49:21.920 --> 0:49:23.560 I mean, yeah, I just think that it's important to 0:49:23.640 --> 0:49:28.279 realize that like there was no there was almost like 0:49:28.440 --> 0:49:31.239 no period when they were celebrated. A lot of them 0:49:31.320 --> 0:49:33.640 got bitter about this, and we tell that story in 0:49:33.680 --> 0:49:36.319 the book. A lot of them get to be old 0:49:36.440 --> 0:49:40.719 men and they're bitter. Yeah, they're bitter about how they've 0:49:40.880 --> 0:49:44.600 been disparaged in their own lifetimes for what they did. 0:49:45.320 --> 0:49:48.480 Yeah, and in some ways, I mean, there are other 0:49:48.640 --> 0:49:51.120 parallels I could I could draw, but they're in there 0:49:51.239 --> 0:49:53.640 later in life, once they're no longer living in this 0:49:53.920 --> 0:49:57.400 world where the hide hunt was a good thing, or 0:49:57.719 --> 0:50:01.359 or you know, even a new like once it became 0:50:01.440 --> 0:50:03.960 a hot button topic and the buffalo wiped out and 0:50:04.640 --> 0:50:08.600 conservations on the rise, they often would look back and 0:50:08.800 --> 0:50:12.000 explain what they were doing in a different way. They 0:50:12.120 --> 0:50:15.840 tried to They tried to reimagine what drove them to 0:50:15.920 --> 0:50:19.800 do what they did in order to align themselves with 0:50:20.480 --> 0:50:23.520 things that were still okay at that time, and so 0:50:24.360 --> 0:50:25.960 a lot of them said, well, we did it to 0:50:26.840 --> 0:50:33.880 tame the frontier, we did it to conquer Native people. 0:50:34.000 --> 0:50:36.279 We did it to sort of, you know, break break 0:50:36.360 --> 0:50:41.680 Indian resistance and open up the West for settlement. But 0:50:41.840 --> 0:50:43.919 what's fascinating is when you go back and you read 0:50:44.040 --> 0:50:46.200 the accounts that were written at the time, as opposed 0:50:46.239 --> 0:50:48.360 to like what they wrote down in nineteen hundred or 0:50:48.440 --> 0:50:52.120 nineteen ten. They always say, I was young, I needed money. 0:50:52.880 --> 0:50:54.800 It was free for the taking. All you needed was 0:50:54.840 --> 0:50:57.080 a rifle. You go out there and you get as 0:50:57.120 --> 0:50:58.880 many as you can, make a lot of money. And 0:50:59.000 --> 0:51:00.920 there's none of these guys at the time or sort 0:51:00.960 --> 0:51:04.600 of thing are explaining their actions in a way that's 0:51:04.680 --> 0:51:07.680 like part of a broader national story of quote unquote progress. 0:51:08.120 --> 0:51:11.480 But as old men, oh yeah, living now, living in 0:51:11.520 --> 0:51:15.320 the nineteen twenties, nineteen thirties, or even just back in 0:51:16.360 --> 0:51:19.880 like during the Roosevelt presidency, they're saying, oh, well, you know, 0:51:20.200 --> 0:51:23.680 we were part of we were part of the American story. 0:51:24.120 --> 0:51:27.520 We weren't bad guys. The whole money thing was just 0:51:27.600 --> 0:51:29.560 decide issue. What we were really trying to do is 0:51:29.600 --> 0:51:31.240 open up the West. For white settlement. 0:51:31.560 --> 0:51:36.319 Yeah, they get terribly sentimental too. This isn't this isn't 0:51:36.360 --> 0:51:38.319 a direct quote, but it would be that you'll get 0:51:38.400 --> 0:51:40.440 this kind of sentiment from them as old men. Like 0:51:41.320 --> 0:51:46.359 when I look and see children coming out of Sunday School, Yeah, 0:51:47.880 --> 0:51:51.960 in the Texas Panhandle, running into the arms of their 0:51:52.120 --> 0:51:52.960 waiting mothers. 0:51:53.680 --> 0:51:56.400 Yeah, I think, by god, I. 0:51:56.480 --> 0:51:57.239 Did the right thing. 0:51:58.600 --> 0:52:02.440 And one of the interesting things about these sort of 0:52:03.280 --> 0:52:06.480 after the fact explanations for their actions, especially as it 0:52:06.560 --> 0:52:09.279 comes to like the consequences for Native people, Like they 0:52:09.719 --> 0:52:12.920 in the early nineteen hundreds, they said, well, this was 0:52:12.960 --> 0:52:15.120 a good and necessary thing. We did it so that 0:52:15.560 --> 0:52:18.080 we could we could defeat the tribes of the Planes. 0:52:19.280 --> 0:52:21.719 At the time, they did that because they thought it 0:52:21.840 --> 0:52:25.160 was something worth celebrating. They said what they did in 0:52:25.200 --> 0:52:27.560 that way, they explained their actions because in a way 0:52:27.600 --> 0:52:32.359 that would be celebrated. But then decades later, once people 0:52:32.440 --> 0:52:35.560 started thinking differently about what happened to the tribes of 0:52:35.600 --> 0:52:39.560 the Planes, they latched on to those explanations because it 0:52:39.640 --> 0:52:41.920 made the guys seem even worse, made the heigh hunters 0:52:41.920 --> 0:52:46.640 seem even more villainous, and so like you almost have 0:52:46.800 --> 0:52:51.200 to go back to what they were saying while they 0:52:51.320 --> 0:52:53.839 did it, rather than what they were saying long after 0:52:53.960 --> 0:52:56.640 the fact, once their actions had sort of taken a 0:52:56.680 --> 0:52:59.680 big shift in sort of the public opinion. 0:53:00.400 --> 0:53:05.640 Yeah. We well, I'm gonna say it now. I keep 0:53:05.680 --> 0:53:07.520 trying to be like really disciplined about what we bring 0:53:07.640 --> 0:53:17.200 up when. But there's a hide hunter who kills over 0:53:17.320 --> 0:53:23.800 ten thousand the buffalo okay, who who lives through the 0:53:23.920 --> 0:53:29.680 Korean War. Yeah, he lives to see we mentioned he 0:53:29.760 --> 0:53:33.360 lives to see like Playboy magazine being published. 0:53:34.120 --> 0:53:36.000 Yeah, he lived to be one hundred and four years old. 0:53:36.320 --> 0:53:39.280 Lives to see here's a guy that's on the Texas 0:53:39.360 --> 0:53:43.880 Plains fighting comanches, shooting buffalo for a living, and he 0:53:44.000 --> 0:53:47.840 lives to like read Playboy magazine, see the introduction of 0:53:47.920 --> 0:53:49.200 the corvette. 0:53:49.239 --> 0:53:52.759 The first Burger king opened before he died, and the 0:53:52.840 --> 0:53:55.839 first nuclear submarine launched before he died. Yeah. 0:53:56.000 --> 0:53:57.000 But he you know, he. 0:53:58.040 --> 0:54:02.520 Listened to the president on the radio. Uh he he uh, 0:54:03.600 --> 0:54:07.080 he drove cars, you know, like there's stories about these 0:54:07.120 --> 0:54:11.440 buffalo hunters. The wife of one buffalo hunter later in 0:54:11.520 --> 0:54:13.600 life said, you know, I hadn't been back to Dodge 0:54:13.680 --> 0:54:17.680 City since the Buffalo Hunt and the interviewers like, well, 0:54:17.719 --> 0:54:20.239 why did you go to Dodge City? Why did you 0:54:20.280 --> 0:54:22.239 go back? And she goes, oh, there is a motorcycle race. 0:54:22.320 --> 0:54:24.160 We're going to watch a motorcycle race. 0:54:25.080 --> 0:54:26.320 Yeah, the extreme like that. 0:54:26.480 --> 0:54:26.520 That. 0:54:26.680 --> 0:54:27.960 That's then we spent a lot of time on it 0:54:28.000 --> 0:54:31.399 is just how abrupt at the end of this era, 0:54:31.600 --> 0:54:36.440 how like abrupt the country changed out of it. And 0:54:37.080 --> 0:54:41.640 a thing we bring up as well, we keep talking 0:54:41.640 --> 0:54:44.000 about these the certain these certain hide hunters who lived 0:54:44.000 --> 0:54:48.960 through the buffalo slaughter and became they kind of stayed that, 0:54:49.000 --> 0:54:52.120 they kind of wanted to continue to defend themselves. And 0:54:52.200 --> 0:54:56.000 we talked about that there's no hide hunter heroes. Now 0:54:56.280 --> 0:55:01.520 that's not entirely accurate, because there's a lot of mythologized 0:55:01.560 --> 0:55:11.200 Western figures who became mythologized later for their exploits as gunfighters, lawmen, gamblers, 0:55:12.440 --> 0:55:15.800 but who you wouldn't realize cut their teeth as hide hunters. 0:55:16.480 --> 0:55:18.000 Uh Wider. 0:55:18.360 --> 0:55:21.280 There's like historians a little bit questioned like how into 0:55:21.520 --> 0:55:25.160 hide hunting wider was he? He was hide hunter adjacent, 0:55:25.320 --> 0:55:28.000 maybe did some high hunting, Wider did some high hunting. 0:55:28.440 --> 0:55:34.800 I'll tell you who absolutely was a highe hunter Pat Garrett, 0:55:35.360 --> 0:55:36.680 the man who killed Billy the Kid. 0:55:37.760 --> 0:55:45.360 We recently had Brian Burrows, Brian Yeah, Brian Burrows on, 0:55:47.239 --> 0:55:51.200 No Burrow Burrow singing of William Burrows. I know that's 0:55:51.239 --> 0:55:53.440 what That's what screwed me. I always do that. 0:55:54.080 --> 0:55:57.560 We recently had the writer Brian Burrow on and his 0:55:57.880 --> 0:56:01.960 very excellent book The Gunfighters, and in The Gunfighters he 0:56:02.080 --> 0:56:05.799 tells the story of the night Billy the Kid died 0:56:06.840 --> 0:56:10.760 in New Mexico, and he talks about that the last 0:56:10.880 --> 0:56:17.719 person Billy the Kid addressed he said ken as to 0:56:17.840 --> 0:56:23.000 a man named John Poe, and then was shortly thereafter 0:56:23.200 --> 0:56:26.640 shot and killed. Will set it again, said the same thing, 0:56:26.800 --> 0:56:29.920 goes into a bedroom, He passes a guy outside and 0:56:29.960 --> 0:56:34.080 says keen as, who is that? Goes into a bedroom, 0:56:34.200 --> 0:56:36.080 says it again to someone in the room, not knowing 0:56:36.120 --> 0:56:38.520 who he's looking at, and that guy kills him dead. 0:56:39.360 --> 0:56:42.239 Those two guys were buffalo hide hunters, but no one 0:56:42.320 --> 0:56:44.920 knows John Poe and Pat Garrett as buffalo heide. 0:56:44.760 --> 0:56:47.000 Hunters their former buffalo hide hunters at the time. 0:56:47.200 --> 0:56:53.560 Bat Masterson gunfighter becomes a sportswriter buffalo hunter. So it's 0:56:53.640 --> 0:56:56.840 not fair to say that the Buffalo Hunters didn't produce heroes, 0:56:56.880 --> 0:56:59.520 but they didn't produce heroes from that. 0:57:00.280 --> 0:57:04.240 They shed that, They shed that identity and became new people. 0:57:04.560 --> 0:57:08.080 Yeah. Some became like dudes that were presidents of banks. 0:57:09.480 --> 0:57:12.320 A lot of them got killed in bars and card games. 0:57:12.760 --> 0:57:17.720 Yeah, many, like many divide, died violently. And that's another 0:57:17.760 --> 0:57:20.200 thing about like the legacy of the hide Hunters is 0:57:21.240 --> 0:57:23.919 you'll find people say, oh, the hide Hunters were nothing 0:57:24.000 --> 0:57:28.240 but horse stephens, scoundrels. Yeah. And the other historians, including 0:57:28.280 --> 0:57:30.439 Elliott West, who we had on the podcast years ago, 0:57:31.040 --> 0:57:34.480 Elliott West has this passage like, oh, they became candy 0:57:34.600 --> 0:57:38.040 salesmen and high school principles. Yeah, and you're like, both 0:57:38.080 --> 0:57:41.160 those things are true. They were some horse stealing scoundrels. Yeah, 0:57:41.240 --> 0:57:44.320 some became candy salesman, like they became all things. 0:57:44.480 --> 0:57:47.600 Yeah, yeah, Elliott Elliott West in that passage he makes 0:57:47.640 --> 0:57:50.920 a point that like the hide hunters stepped out of 0:57:51.040 --> 0:57:53.760 normal life to become hide hunters. You know, they were 0:57:53.840 --> 0:57:56.120 like farmers, they were guys that worked on the railroad, 0:57:56.200 --> 0:57:59.800 they were they have these they weren't born to be 0:58:01.040 --> 0:58:03.520 right and like boone was born to be right, and 0:58:03.600 --> 0:58:06.360 there was there was an opportunity, and they stepped into 0:58:06.440 --> 0:58:09.080 that world and they they did what they did, and 0:58:09.200 --> 0:58:13.000 then that world vanished along with the buffalo, and they 0:58:13.480 --> 0:58:14.520 moved on to the next thing. 0:58:15.520 --> 0:58:19.440 Uh, it's more appropriate to say this is a segue. 0:58:20.000 --> 0:58:23.480 It's more appropriate to say that these Buffalo hide hunters, 0:58:24.160 --> 0:58:29.640 who we no one understand and have condemned for exterminating 0:58:29.720 --> 0:58:35.960 the American buffalo. Yes, they stepped out of normal life. 0:58:36.040 --> 0:58:39.360 But it's more it's it's better to say, yeah, they 0:58:39.600 --> 0:58:44.080 stepped out of the American Civil War. 0:58:44.480 --> 0:58:49.840 Yeah, Yeah, that's something that I it's something that you 0:58:50.000 --> 0:58:53.040 hear about this era. Like a lot of these Buffalo 0:58:53.120 --> 0:58:56.840 Hunters were formal former Civil War soldiers or somehow affected. 0:58:56.880 --> 0:59:00.200 Their lives were affected by the Civil War. But you 0:59:00.320 --> 0:59:03.320 really don't have a full appreciation for it until you 0:59:03.480 --> 0:59:08.480 start reading their individual stories, by the dozens, and it's 0:59:08.640 --> 0:59:14.240 just it's overwhelming. Frank Mayor, the guy who lived to 0:59:14.280 --> 0:59:18.200 see Burger King and Playboy magazine. He was a thirteen 0:59:18.280 --> 0:59:19.160 year old drummer boy. 0:59:19.280 --> 0:59:21.680 Wonder if you ever read Playboy while eating Burger King. 0:59:22.040 --> 0:59:23.720 I think he's in a corvette. 0:59:23.520 --> 0:59:25.760 At one hundred and four. He I hope he was 0:59:25.840 --> 0:59:30.640 doing all that stuff. It's doubtful though, is that. Baby. 0:59:30.720 --> 0:59:34.200 I'm gonna take my corvette down, pick up the April issue, 0:59:34.400 --> 0:59:35.640 get a burger, get a. 0:59:35.800 --> 0:59:39.400 Whopper, just for the articles, of course. Yeah, yeah, well 0:59:39.480 --> 0:59:39.720 that was. 0:59:39.760 --> 0:59:42.120 Back when when you really could read some good stuff 0:59:42.160 --> 0:59:46.640 in there, you know, to be a country. So he Yeah. 0:59:46.720 --> 0:59:48.320 Frank Mayor, the guy who lived to be one hundred 0:59:48.320 --> 0:59:51.200 and four, he was a thirteen year old drummer boy, 0:59:51.880 --> 0:59:54.840 serving they think, in his father's artillery unit at the 0:59:54.880 --> 0:59:59.120 Battle of Gettysburg. If you can imagine what he witnessed 0:59:59.240 --> 1:00:03.600 during that period of time as a thirteen year old, like, 1:00:03.720 --> 1:00:07.600 it's hard to imagine him going on to just live 1:00:07.640 --> 1:00:10.960 a quiet life somewhere right. And he even makes the 1:00:11.080 --> 1:00:16.720 point in his memoir that after the Civil War there 1:00:16.760 --> 1:00:22.439 were a ton of men who didn't know what was next, 1:00:23.600 --> 1:00:26.920 but they knew they knew they had to move on, right, 1:00:27.240 --> 1:00:29.320 and so they were sort of lost. They were looking 1:00:29.440 --> 1:00:33.280 for purpose. A lot of them like they'd lost family members, 1:00:33.320 --> 1:00:37.560 They might have lost fathers. John Cook. I don't know 1:00:37.600 --> 1:00:38.680 if we mentioned Cook yet. 1:00:38.840 --> 1:00:41.480 No, we haven't mentioned Cook yet, but a very like 1:00:42.720 --> 1:00:46.040 Cook also comes out of one of the most ugly 1:00:46.280 --> 1:00:49.200 violent aspects of the Civil War, which and we explained 1:00:49.200 --> 1:00:51.760 it a little bit, which is not widely known about. 1:00:51.480 --> 1:00:53.480 What was going on in that period. But yeah, so 1:00:53.600 --> 1:00:56.960 he's he's his family moves out to Missouri, and so 1:00:57.280 --> 1:01:01.040 they get all wrapped up in the guerrilla fighting that's 1:01:01.120 --> 1:01:05.800 going on on the Kansas Missouri border. And his brother 1:01:06.280 --> 1:01:12.480 is shot twenty seven times. His brother was serving he. 1:01:12.560 --> 1:01:15.680 Shot pieces, yeah, like a revenge attack. 1:01:15.800 --> 1:01:19.840 And his brother is serving in a Union military unit. 1:01:20.320 --> 1:01:23.640 And some Confederates earlier that day had killed some Union 1:01:23.760 --> 1:01:26.840 soldiers and put on their uniforms, and so they marched 1:01:26.880 --> 1:01:29.680 right up to Cook's brother and he got shot twenty 1:01:29.800 --> 1:01:34.280 seven times. And the commanding officer of that unit gave 1:01:34.440 --> 1:01:37.760 John Cook his brother's hat that's just soaked in blood 1:01:37.800 --> 1:01:40.360 and full of holes, and says, you know, this is 1:01:40.440 --> 1:01:42.720 what we have left your brother, Bring it to your mom. 1:01:43.680 --> 1:01:47.560 And so even though Cook himself was like again a youngster, 1:01:48.080 --> 1:01:49.880 you know, he didn't like bear the brunt of the fighting, 1:01:49.960 --> 1:01:54.880 like the Civil War profoundly brought an end to his 1:01:55.080 --> 1:01:58.440 like childhood innocence. And then there's guys that served as 1:01:58.480 --> 1:02:02.520 prisoners of war and guys that there's one hide hunter 1:02:02.640 --> 1:02:07.080 who won the Congressional Medal of Honor. And there's a 1:02:07.320 --> 1:02:09.800 you know, we have stories of like a guy who 1:02:09.960 --> 1:02:12.560 is a Confederate soldier who is he was at a 1:02:12.680 --> 1:02:17.920 fort that was went under siege and like two thirds 1:02:18.000 --> 1:02:20.280 of the guys in there with them had died by 1:02:20.360 --> 1:02:22.680 the time they surrendered, so you can imagine. 1:02:22.800 --> 1:02:24.800 And then he that's the guy he gets taken up 1:02:24.840 --> 1:02:28.640 to a military prison in the North at the end 1:02:28.680 --> 1:02:32.160 of the war, walks home to North Carolina, Yeah, and 1:02:32.240 --> 1:02:34.800 then heads out. That's important thing to bring up is 1:02:35.680 --> 1:02:40.560 Confederate like not just Union, but Union and Confederate soldiers 1:02:40.640 --> 1:02:44.280 in the years immediately after the war, within a decade 1:02:44.320 --> 1:02:49.840 after the war are coming together in hunting outfits in Texas. 1:02:50.280 --> 1:02:53.880 Yeah. Yeah, And and you also there's a couple of 1:02:53.920 --> 1:03:00.400 interesting stories of brothers, the Clarkson brothers, the l of 1:03:00.480 --> 1:03:04.120 the three. He served in the war, and then afterwards 1:03:04.720 --> 1:03:06.600 they said he grew his hair out long, and he 1:03:06.680 --> 1:03:09.919 went out west and started trapping wolves. And then once 1:03:10.120 --> 1:03:14.600 the buffalo hunt got underway, he wrote to his other 1:03:14.680 --> 1:03:17.240 brothers and said, come on out, you got it. And 1:03:17.320 --> 1:03:21.160 these guys killed I believe twenty thousand Buffalo during their 1:03:21.200 --> 1:03:24.760 career as Buffalo hunters. And there's another guy. He writes 1:03:24.840 --> 1:03:27.520 to his brother, and that guy comes out and he 1:03:27.600 --> 1:03:29.880 brings a rifle and a canteen and a compass, and 1:03:29.960 --> 1:03:34.800 they're all his Union issued like army army gears. So 1:03:36.680 --> 1:03:41.600 we begin this story in eighteen sixty five because the 1:03:41.760 --> 1:03:44.280 connection to the end of the Civil War is sort 1:03:44.280 --> 1:03:48.920 of inarguable, but the hunt itself really doesn't get underway 1:03:49.080 --> 1:03:52.280 until later, until six years later. Essentially. 1:03:52.520 --> 1:03:54.960 Yeah, there's a little device we use in these American 1:03:55.040 --> 1:04:00.280 history pieces where we like to bracket. We like to 1:04:00.360 --> 1:04:05.840 bracket like the years that we're talking about, which is no, 1:04:05.960 --> 1:04:08.280 it's true. Yeah, But what we also do is we 1:04:08.400 --> 1:04:09.520 also hint at we. 1:04:11.080 --> 1:04:11.600 Bracket it. 1:04:12.040 --> 1:04:15.320 Okay. So with the Long Hunters, we say in the 1:04:15.400 --> 1:04:19.160 title met Eater's American History, the Long Hunters seventeen sixty 1:04:19.240 --> 1:04:23.760 three to seventeen seventy five. Seventeen sixty three being the 1:04:23.880 --> 1:04:25.680 end of the French and Indian War or the Seven 1:04:25.760 --> 1:04:28.600 Years War, so you get a period of relative peace 1:04:28.680 --> 1:04:32.320 on the frontier which allows guys to somewhat more safely 1:04:33.360 --> 1:04:37.280 go into the colonial frontier to hunt. Seventeen seventy five, 1:04:37.400 --> 1:04:41.560 of course, is the year before the American Revolution, which 1:04:41.920 --> 1:04:44.720 brings in this very bloodied period on the American frontier 1:04:44.760 --> 1:04:48.160 when it becomes really hard to hunt. But then, of 1:04:48.280 --> 1:04:52.120 course we explain a lot about like what happens before 1:04:52.240 --> 1:04:55.800 seventeen sixty three, yeah, and in a little bit about 1:04:55.800 --> 1:05:00.760 what happens after seventeen seventy five, But the era is 1:05:00.880 --> 1:05:04.960 that with the Mountain Men eighteen oh six, so that's 1:05:05.000 --> 1:05:07.400 the return of the Lewis and Clark expedition. However, we 1:05:07.480 --> 1:05:11.080 explain a little bit about the Louisiana purchase, which is 1:05:11.200 --> 1:05:14.040 before that, but the action is like the return of 1:05:14.320 --> 1:05:18.040 Lewis and Clark and the reports of great quantities of 1:05:18.120 --> 1:05:21.240 beavers in the American West with the collapse of the 1:05:21.320 --> 1:05:26.440 market in eighteen forty. The hide Hunter story, we're saying 1:05:26.560 --> 1:05:30.280 sixty five, And as we explain, it's because you can't 1:05:30.400 --> 1:05:33.840 understand the hide Hunters without understanding the Civil War from 1:05:33.880 --> 1:05:38.800 a standpoint of firearms, from a standpoint of railroads, yeah, 1:05:39.000 --> 1:05:41.640 from a little bit of politics, okay, and from the 1:05:41.720 --> 1:05:46.280 standpoint of creating a generation of displaced young men. But 1:05:46.680 --> 1:05:54.640 the shooting doesn't start till about seven years later. Yeah, 1:05:54.960 --> 1:05:58.600 the shooting really starts in eighteen seventy two. 1:05:59.200 --> 1:06:04.320 And on the railroad. On the railroad, note, like the 1:06:04.400 --> 1:06:08.600 trans Continental railroads are authorized during the Civil War, and 1:06:08.720 --> 1:06:15.200 that's tied to politics and questions about you know, like 1:06:16.000 --> 1:06:21.800 keeping California in the Union. And also the northern elected 1:06:21.840 --> 1:06:25.400 officials don't no longer have to concede things to the South, 1:06:25.480 --> 1:06:28.400 so it's really a Northern project. So they authorize the 1:06:28.440 --> 1:06:31.480 trans Continental railroads. They really don't get construction. They don't 1:06:31.480 --> 1:06:33.720 make a lot of progress and construction untill after the war. 1:06:34.200 --> 1:06:38.000 But the railroads are important for two reasons. One, the 1:06:38.080 --> 1:06:41.200 sheer logistics of moving all these buffalo skins off the 1:06:41.280 --> 1:06:44.800 planes is unimaginable without the railroads in the quantities that 1:06:44.840 --> 1:06:49.080 they're moving them. Two, a lot of these Civil War 1:06:49.200 --> 1:06:52.320 veterans got they sort of cut their teeth as buffalo 1:06:52.440 --> 1:06:57.840 hunters shooting meat to feed railroad workers, and so they 1:06:57.920 --> 1:07:03.280 were already making this transition into market hunters before the 1:07:03.360 --> 1:07:05.520 hide hunt as meat hunters. 1:07:06.000 --> 1:07:10.360 Yeah, I'd like to explain one example that just because 1:07:10.360 --> 1:07:13.360 it's a name people are gonna be familiar with. If 1:07:13.400 --> 1:07:18.640 you're sitting there now listening to this, if one buffalo hunter. No, 1:07:19.000 --> 1:07:21.200 I'm not saying a hide hunter. A buffalo hunter you 1:07:21.360 --> 1:07:27.160 probably know is Buffalo Bill Cody. Buffalo Bill Cody never 1:07:27.240 --> 1:07:30.919 participated in the hide hunt. Buffalo. Bill Cody shot four 1:07:31.080 --> 1:07:36.960 thousand buffalo as a meat hunter for the railroad, but 1:07:37.080 --> 1:07:39.520 then got off on other ventures, got into the show, 1:07:39.680 --> 1:07:42.960 got into show business and some high profile guiding. He 1:07:43.120 --> 1:07:45.920 never made the transition, but other guys like that, like picture, 1:07:45.960 --> 1:07:49.080 you got a guy like a guy like Bill Cody, Buffalo. 1:07:49.120 --> 1:07:55.200 Bill Cody kills four thousand for the meat. This guy 1:07:55.280 --> 1:07:59.000 has perfected the has perfected the skill. Yeah, so you 1:07:59.200 --> 1:08:01.960 had these dudes when the hide market takes off, and 1:08:02.000 --> 1:08:04.920 we explain in great detail why the hyde market exploded. 1:08:05.960 --> 1:08:08.320 When the hide market takes off, you got guys that 1:08:08.400 --> 1:08:09.080 are rare and to go. 1:08:09.280 --> 1:08:11.800 Yeah, and they don't need to figure out how to 1:08:11.880 --> 1:08:16.519 kill buffalo. Yeah, they've had their sort of professional apprenticeship 1:08:16.720 --> 1:08:19.880 as meat hunters and they're selling meat. Not only two 1:08:21.080 --> 1:08:24.760 railroad camps. Like you think about all the laborers needed 1:08:24.800 --> 1:08:28.439 for these infrastructure projects. Like there's companies that get a 1:08:28.520 --> 1:08:31.800 contract from the railroad to board and house all of 1:08:31.880 --> 1:08:34.760 the workers, and then those companies are going out and 1:08:34.880 --> 1:08:37.120 hiring a guy like Bill Cody to kill buffalo and 1:08:37.200 --> 1:08:40.840 it's like eight to day or something like that. They're 1:08:40.880 --> 1:08:44.800 also getting contracts to supply meat to forts, like there's 1:08:44.880 --> 1:08:50.080 military forts being established across the west to guard the 1:08:50.200 --> 1:08:54.040 railroad and also to wage war on the tribes. And 1:08:54.200 --> 1:08:57.200 so there's civilians who are going out and hunting buffalo 1:08:57.320 --> 1:09:00.040 to feed the soldiers. And then they're also engaging in 1:09:00.360 --> 1:09:05.760 a more limited scale selling meat to butchers or meat 1:09:05.840 --> 1:09:09.000 stores in the east, restaurants, hotels, whatever. It's sort of 1:09:09.040 --> 1:09:15.960 a curiosity. But all these there's very much like an 1:09:16.080 --> 1:09:24.080 intact robust trade in buffalo products before the hide hunt 1:09:24.600 --> 1:09:25.240 gets rolling. 1:09:25.920 --> 1:09:28.080 Yeah, like if you imagine all of a sudden, squirrel 1:09:28.160 --> 1:09:33.080 brains are worth ten thousand dollars of brain, who's best 1:09:33.160 --> 1:09:34.640 suited to capitalize on that. 1:09:34.760 --> 1:09:37.719 Explodes that market Kevin Murphy. Kevin Murphy. 1:09:40.040 --> 1:09:42.560 So people later one hundred years later saying, do you 1:09:42.600 --> 1:09:44.760 know that Kevin Murphy used to just hunt squirrels, like 1:09:44.840 --> 1:09:50.400 for the meat. People don't realize this, and yeah, everybody 1:09:50.479 --> 1:09:51.920 knows him as the squirrel brain hunter. 1:09:52.400 --> 1:09:58.840 It's so funny because they like the Clarkson's the who 1:09:58.920 --> 1:10:01.840 I mentioned earlier the three. A lot of them will 1:10:01.880 --> 1:10:04.360 come out west not really knowing what they're doing, and 1:10:04.439 --> 1:10:07.840 then they get a job cutting wood to supply firewood 1:10:07.960 --> 1:10:10.400 to a military base, or cutting wood to supply firewood 1:10:10.439 --> 1:10:13.160 to a railroad camp, and then they realize another one 1:10:13.160 --> 1:10:14.960 of the guys cutting wood has sort of a side 1:10:15.040 --> 1:10:19.120 gig shooting buffalo, and then they realize, oh, I could 1:10:19.200 --> 1:10:21.479 do that. And then they realize if I got a 1:10:21.520 --> 1:10:23.720 wagon of my own to haul this meet, I could 1:10:23.800 --> 1:10:26.760 just kill buffalo all the time. And so there's like 1:10:27.080 --> 1:10:29.200 a series of years leading up to the hide hunt 1:10:29.280 --> 1:10:32.519 where there's sort of this professional class developing, and there's 1:10:32.520 --> 1:10:34.840 still like a huge rush of outsiders once the hide 1:10:34.920 --> 1:10:37.240 hunt gets out our way, but like there's very much 1:10:37.360 --> 1:10:42.160 like a well developed expertise around killing buffalo, like especially 1:10:42.280 --> 1:10:44.200 in Kansas where it gets rippen. 1:10:47.360 --> 1:10:49.920 We should touch real quick on this idea that we 1:10:50.040 --> 1:10:53.120 talk about with the long hunters, that oftentimes a long 1:10:53.240 --> 1:11:00.679 hunting expedition would be people related, strong familial connection coming 1:11:00.800 --> 1:11:05.000 out of a specific settlement, oftentimes like in the Yadkin 1:11:05.120 --> 1:11:07.320 Valley of North Carolina, but coming out of these small 1:11:07.439 --> 1:11:12.760 agrarian settlements loosely connected individuals and they become like a 1:11:13.479 --> 1:11:16.760 like a they launch a long hunting expedition. It could 1:11:16.760 --> 1:11:18.360 be forty guys, it could be five guys. 1:11:19.439 --> 1:11:20.080 The mountain men. 1:11:20.800 --> 1:11:23.880 You have this thing with Uh, it's just all these 1:11:25.040 --> 1:11:30.000 many uprooted, displaced young men sort of randomly thrown together. 1:11:31.040 --> 1:11:34.400 It's not a family enterprise. With the hide hunters. You 1:11:34.439 --> 1:11:36.479 do get a little bit back into a there is 1:11:36.600 --> 1:11:39.439 some family stuff. Yeah, but we bring up this term. 1:11:39.479 --> 1:11:41.960 It's a it's a beautiful term and I'm surprised I 1:11:42.000 --> 1:11:43.479 had never heard it before. It's so great. We get 1:11:43.520 --> 1:11:45.920 into this thing called siphon. I don't the way you 1:11:45.960 --> 1:11:48.960 picked the Randall introduced this word to me. Siphon migration 1:11:49.680 --> 1:11:53.559 m H where a person will a person will move 1:11:53.640 --> 1:11:57.880 out west, start doing well in the Buffalo high trade. 1:11:58.479 --> 1:12:01.320 And then and then heunctions as a sort of siphon 1:12:01.360 --> 1:12:04.320 and starts pulling people out with them. 1:12:04.840 --> 1:12:06.519 Come on out, you guys gotta get in on this. 1:12:06.760 --> 1:12:11.040 Yeah. So like cousins, brothers, whatever, get on the train 1:12:11.439 --> 1:12:14.479 or ride and they're coming out of Ohio, Illinois, Virginia, 1:12:14.520 --> 1:12:19.360 whatever it is, and they're being drawn out by someone 1:12:19.439 --> 1:12:21.880 in their social network, someone in their family. They're being 1:12:22.000 --> 1:12:25.840 drawn out to get in on the bonanza. You also 1:12:25.920 --> 1:12:29.439 have these organizations that they've called an outfit, who are 1:12:29.520 --> 1:12:36.400 coming together, oftentimes like under specific job titles. It's a 1:12:36.520 --> 1:12:40.080 hierarchical structure. The mountain men would work for these giant 1:12:40.479 --> 1:12:44.600 by the time would have been like corporations. They had financiers. 1:12:44.960 --> 1:12:49.679 They're like VC backed corporations hired the mountain men. There's 1:12:49.760 --> 1:12:53.120 no corporate structure with the hide hunters. It's like whoever 1:12:53.240 --> 1:12:56.720 has the money to buy the equipment is the top 1:12:56.760 --> 1:13:00.280 of the hierarchy, and they'll be that. Usually that guy 1:13:00.360 --> 1:13:03.960 is the shooter, but then he has like specific roles 1:13:04.080 --> 1:13:06.799 with specific for specific skill sets. You have a shooter, 1:13:07.720 --> 1:13:10.760 you have a skinner, maybe you have two skinners, you 1:13:10.880 --> 1:13:13.920 have a camp cook, and these are like assigned roles 1:13:14.040 --> 1:13:17.280 and you can you can climb through the hierarchy. Yeah, 1:13:18.520 --> 1:13:21.479 but it's like it's like a it's a job description, 1:13:21.640 --> 1:13:24.120 it's a skill, and you can go apply that skill. 1:13:24.600 --> 1:13:27.439 I could be I'm gonna go cook for Randall's outfit. 1:13:27.840 --> 1:13:29.639 I'm gonna get sick of that, and the next year 1:13:29.920 --> 1:13:32.559 I'm gonna go and sign a similar deal and get 1:13:32.600 --> 1:13:34.120 a job cooking for Fhill's outfit. 1:13:34.520 --> 1:13:39.439 Yeah, and it's the I'm forgetting the name of the historian, 1:13:39.520 --> 1:13:41.960 but he talks about this idea of crew culture where 1:13:42.040 --> 1:13:45.719 you develop, like an industry develops, this sort of well 1:13:45.880 --> 1:13:52.960 recognized a blueprint for how a crew works and if 1:13:53.000 --> 1:13:55.040 you if you make it through a season with one crew, 1:13:55.120 --> 1:13:57.200 you can pretty seamlessly hop onto the other crew. And 1:13:57.320 --> 1:14:01.400 you think about this as like guys in relative dangerous professions. 1:14:03.840 --> 1:14:06.640 You know, if you think about like logging, like wildfire 1:14:06.760 --> 1:14:11.240 crews or commercial fishermen, it's often people sort of in 1:14:11.360 --> 1:14:15.479 dangerous jobs. There's high turnover and there's like some hazing 1:14:15.640 --> 1:14:18.679 involved and once you but once you know the lingo, 1:14:19.479 --> 1:14:21.559 and once you have your own sort of set of tools, 1:14:22.360 --> 1:14:24.760 like you can you can bounce around and so so 1:14:24.920 --> 1:14:29.040 these buffalo hunting outfits are really small scale outfits, maybe 1:14:29.600 --> 1:14:34.080 four or five guys, some you know, twelve fifteen. I 1:14:34.160 --> 1:14:36.960 think they're in rare instances. There's some crews of twenty, 1:14:37.040 --> 1:14:41.280 but they all have very well defined jobs and there's 1:14:41.320 --> 1:14:44.320 a well defined sort of order of operations in terms 1:14:44.360 --> 1:14:46.439 of how you kill the buffalo, how you skin them, 1:14:46.520 --> 1:14:51.840 how you process them, and everybody's doing it. The same. 1:14:52.960 --> 1:14:56.200 And what's sort of just circle back one bit when 1:14:56.240 --> 1:14:59.080 you're talking about all the money in the in the 1:14:59.160 --> 1:15:01.560 fur business being tied up in like the corporations that 1:15:01.640 --> 1:15:05.320 are hiring the trappers, the big money in the buffalo 1:15:05.479 --> 1:15:08.200 hunt story is with these companies that are sort of 1:15:08.280 --> 1:15:13.280 in the import export business. They're they're trafficking in furs 1:15:13.520 --> 1:15:15.680 and leather and other goods, but they're just sort of 1:15:15.840 --> 1:15:20.040 they're in Kansas City, sort of these big hubs on 1:15:20.200 --> 1:15:24.040 the eastern side of the planes, and they are moving 1:15:24.479 --> 1:15:26.960 these skins by the thousands to tanneries in the east. 1:15:26.960 --> 1:15:31.000 They're sort of brokers like middlemen, and they actually are 1:15:31.800 --> 1:15:35.320 sending flyers out onto the planes explaining to guys how 1:15:35.360 --> 1:15:39.120 to skin, how to how to care for your skins, 1:15:39.560 --> 1:15:42.960 how to like like what the process is, what they want. 1:15:43.720 --> 1:15:46.800 And then essentially all you need is a wagon which 1:15:46.880 --> 1:15:50.320 is still a big investment in a rifle, and you 1:15:50.439 --> 1:15:52.280 go out and kill all the buffalo you can. And 1:15:52.400 --> 1:15:56.280 then a fur buyer or a hide buyer i should say, 1:15:57.640 --> 1:16:01.080 moves either. Either you go to town and sell your 1:16:01.160 --> 1:16:02.800 hides to them of the town and they're sort of 1:16:03.040 --> 1:16:05.880 a field agent for one of these big brokers, or 1:16:05.960 --> 1:16:08.840 they are even traveling around in the field to different 1:16:08.880 --> 1:16:11.640 camps and hauling the hauling the hides away, buying them 1:16:11.720 --> 1:16:15.639 directly in camps. So the hunters themselves and their crews 1:16:15.720 --> 1:16:18.479 or of these autonomous units on the periphery, and then 1:16:18.520 --> 1:16:23.720 there's there's a real hierarchical network of buyers that sort 1:16:23.760 --> 1:16:27.000 of vacuum and funnel all this stuff up to places 1:16:27.080 --> 1:16:27.840 like Kansas City. 1:16:29.120 --> 1:16:29.240 Uh. 1:16:30.280 --> 1:16:32.599 We were when we worked on this, we were struggling 1:16:32.640 --> 1:16:38.040 to be like, how do you describe the chaos of 1:16:38.080 --> 1:16:41.559 the Civil War, to understand how it's spinning people out, 1:16:47.840 --> 1:16:52.160 Like people know how horrible it is. So in world 1:16:52.600 --> 1:16:54.560 in World War Two, we lost about two hundred and 1:16:54.560 --> 1:16:58.679 fifty thousand Americans. In Vietnam we lost fifty seven thousand Americans. 1:17:00.439 --> 1:17:05.680 And the Civil War we lost this is combatants, and. 1:17:05.760 --> 1:17:07.840 When our population was considerably lower. 1:17:08.000 --> 1:17:14.200 Yeah, between the two armies comprised of you know, of Americans, 1:17:16.720 --> 1:17:23.760 seven hundred thousand dead combatants. In many communities, you took 1:17:23.800 --> 1:17:27.920 away an entire In many communities, you the war carried 1:17:27.960 --> 1:17:32.960 away entire generations of men. You in communities, you went 1:17:33.040 --> 1:17:39.360 and you you eliminated people, say seventeen to twenty eight 1:17:39.479 --> 1:17:41.280 or so. I mean you like you had it be 1:17:41.360 --> 1:17:48.560 where that town lost that bracket of individuals that that 1:17:48.720 --> 1:17:55.360 war killed off eight percent of the white men aged 1:17:55.400 --> 1:18:00.400 between thirteen and forty three. Remember said we lost fifty 1:18:00.439 --> 1:18:05.280 seven thousand and US soldiers in Vietnam, fifty thousand, fifty 1:18:05.400 --> 1:18:10.960 thousand civilians died in the Civil War. Sixty thousand people 1:18:11.080 --> 1:18:16.720 lost arms and legs in the Civil War. So by 1:18:16.800 --> 1:18:19.320 beginning this story in the Civil War, it's like you 1:18:19.600 --> 1:18:27.800 have literally destroyed huge swaths of the country and people 1:18:28.000 --> 1:18:30.200 needed something to go do. And the reason I bring 1:18:30.280 --> 1:18:31.599 this up and that kind of the reason we focus 1:18:31.680 --> 1:18:34.600 on this, Well, the main reason we focus on this 1:18:34.720 --> 1:18:36.720 is because it's like it's the truth and it's how 1:18:36.800 --> 1:18:40.519 things happened. But a big part of the a big 1:18:40.600 --> 1:18:47.720 impetus in like explaining the situation is I feel that 1:18:48.120 --> 1:18:54.120 coming and saying all the hide hunters were these sadistic 1:18:55.600 --> 1:19:01.799 people hell bent on destroying American wildlife, It's not accurate. 1:19:02.800 --> 1:19:05.560 I think that some of them, not think some of 1:19:05.600 --> 1:19:08.880 them were aware of the destruction they were doing. Some 1:19:09.080 --> 1:19:13.479 of them in the moment articulated an acute awareness of 1:19:13.600 --> 1:19:16.640 the destruction they were doing. But there's more to the 1:19:16.760 --> 1:19:19.400 story than just to be that these were like sadistic 1:19:20.280 --> 1:19:27.280 money grubbing executioners of wildlife, Like these were often people 1:19:28.240 --> 1:19:34.120 that had like not just like little opportunity, no opportunity. 1:19:34.400 --> 1:19:36.880 And though we weren't using this term at the time, 1:19:37.560 --> 1:19:42.960 about trauma, being shell shocked whatever, people coming out of 1:19:43.200 --> 1:19:49.880 horrific circumstances with absolutely no promise of employment. 1:19:51.479 --> 1:19:55.960 Yeah, and I think two like a lot of them 1:19:56.280 --> 1:19:58.919 were refugees. Like when we think about the Great Depression 1:19:59.200 --> 1:20:01.320 and we think about like the you know, the grapes 1:20:01.320 --> 1:20:04.280 of wrath, like people heading out looking for work, like 1:20:04.360 --> 1:20:07.040 hitting the road looking for work, Like that's the situation 1:20:07.200 --> 1:20:12.360 on the ground in eighteen sixty five, and there's something 1:20:12.400 --> 1:20:16.000 like two hundred thousand people in the South lost their homes. 1:20:16.800 --> 1:20:20.679 So they are you know, not only maybe their farms 1:20:20.720 --> 1:20:22.600 had been burned, like their crops had been burned, like 1:20:24.560 --> 1:20:28.640 they're they're unmoored from what their lives had been like 1:20:29.400 --> 1:20:35.160 prior to this. And like we mentioned, you know, there's 1:20:35.200 --> 1:20:38.080 a there's a clear opportunity in the Buffalo market. And 1:20:38.120 --> 1:20:40.600 then the other the other side of that is like 1:20:40.680 --> 1:20:43.919 the eighteen seventies were a time of serious economic upheaval, 1:20:44.720 --> 1:20:49.879 and there's all sorts of financial panics and businesses failing, 1:20:50.080 --> 1:20:54.080 people getting laid off, unemployed, and so you find these 1:20:54.680 --> 1:20:57.240 in these accounts, like somebody's explaining why they became a 1:20:57.320 --> 1:21:00.599 buffalo hunter, and they're like, well, the ground oppers eight 1:21:00.680 --> 1:21:04.439 my crops, and I had to feed my family, so 1:21:05.000 --> 1:21:08.640 so I became a buffalo hunter. There's another story that 1:21:09.600 --> 1:21:14.360 a bunch of butchers from Saint Louis had shown up 1:21:14.960 --> 1:21:18.080 on the planes looking to cut buffalo because they'd all 1:21:18.160 --> 1:21:23.000 lost their jobs in a financial crisis. Right, and so like, 1:21:23.160 --> 1:21:27.160 even after the Civil War, the country's on very rocky 1:21:27.240 --> 1:21:34.080 footing and and it's very it's overwhelmingly clear from the 1:21:34.200 --> 1:21:39.479 stories that these people left behind that there's there's obviously 1:21:39.600 --> 1:21:42.360 some like hunger for adventure in frontier life and all that, 1:21:42.560 --> 1:21:46.599 but it's so overwhelmingly clear that these are people who 1:21:46.800 --> 1:21:48.759 are desperate. 1:21:49.439 --> 1:21:54.080 Another thing that's kicking out people onto the frontier is 1:21:54.680 --> 1:21:58.599 the progress of the railroads. Viewed in hindsight, the progress 1:21:58.640 --> 1:22:02.360 of the railroads was was was stunningly fast, but at 1:22:02.439 --> 1:22:07.000 times there'd be pauses. The Northern Pacific Railroad paused in Bismarck, 1:22:07.080 --> 1:22:10.040 North Dakota like just shut down. So you'd bring out 1:22:10.080 --> 1:22:12.720 all these workers and create this job opportunity and now 1:22:12.720 --> 1:22:16.680 and then money would dry up. Things that happened, and 1:22:16.720 --> 1:22:19.000 all of a sudden it just like but we're done, yep. 1:22:19.520 --> 1:22:22.800 And so here you have people on the frontier who 1:22:23.000 --> 1:22:24.519 just had the rug. 1:22:24.439 --> 1:22:26.400 Pulled out and they can't get a bus ticket home. 1:22:26.640 --> 1:22:29.560 Yeah, and so that you'd like you were sort of 1:22:29.640 --> 1:22:33.760 like dumping people, like displacing dumped people out on the 1:22:33.800 --> 1:22:36.960 planes on the American frontier. And a lot of these guys, 1:22:37.040 --> 1:22:38.720 if you look at how they creep into it, like 1:22:38.840 --> 1:22:42.080 Randall said, I mean, they're doing like pretty lowly work 1:22:42.520 --> 1:22:45.519 like cutting firewood and then trying to haul firewood and 1:22:45.640 --> 1:22:48.120 sell it to a military fort. No one's getting rich 1:22:48.160 --> 1:22:52.439 cutting firewood, but that is putting them in position to 1:22:52.560 --> 1:22:55.000 be queued up to participate in the hide hunt. 1:22:55.600 --> 1:23:01.080 Yeah. One story that is probably worth mentioning is there's 1:23:01.080 --> 1:23:04.639 a guy named Elijah Cox who's actually a freed slave 1:23:05.520 --> 1:23:10.120 and he he served in the Buffalo Soldiers, the cavalry 1:23:10.320 --> 1:23:15.960 all black cavalry unit, and he gets discharged and he's 1:23:16.400 --> 1:23:20.000 he's discharged in Texas's I believe he's born in Michigan. 1:23:20.439 --> 1:23:23.479 So he gets discharged in Texas at some point fighting 1:23:23.520 --> 1:23:28.080 the apaches, and he doesn't have anything else to do, 1:23:28.240 --> 1:23:31.200 so he becomes a cook for a buffalo hunting outfit, 1:23:32.320 --> 1:23:34.800 and then after a couple of seasons of serving as 1:23:34.840 --> 1:23:38.519 a cook, he becomes a skinner. And and after a 1:23:38.560 --> 1:23:41.280 couple of seasons of serving as a skinner, one of 1:23:41.320 --> 1:23:43.759 the hunters in the outfit like breaks his leg or something, 1:23:43.960 --> 1:23:48.320 and so Elijah Cox gets to be a shooter. And 1:23:48.640 --> 1:23:52.240 so it's one of these sort of strange stories of 1:23:52.760 --> 1:23:57.280 like he spent he spent many years involved in the trade, 1:23:58.000 --> 1:24:02.280 worked his way up. Had know. It was not a 1:24:02.360 --> 1:24:05.479 plan that he had, right, It's just circumstances where he 1:24:05.520 --> 1:24:09.640 found himself. And and ultimately I think he killed some 1:24:09.880 --> 1:24:10.559 seven hundred. 1:24:11.080 --> 1:24:12.760 Yeah, he had an AskMen of how many got And 1:24:12.840 --> 1:24:15.080 I think that when he when he got cut loose 1:24:15.120 --> 1:24:16.840 from the military, if I remember right, and it's in 1:24:17.479 --> 1:24:20.920 we explained it in here, I think he got cut 1:24:20.960 --> 1:24:22.240 loose from the military from an injury. 1:24:22.720 --> 1:24:25.639 Yeah, yeah, he was he was like medically discharged. Yeah, 1:24:25.800 --> 1:24:28.320 so here he is he's just on the frontier, yeah, 1:24:28.520 --> 1:24:31.400 with no network, like like nothing to fall back on. 1:24:33.080 --> 1:24:35.760 Later when he was asked about it. You know, we're 1:24:35.760 --> 1:24:37.760 talking about earlier, we were talking about the way people 1:24:37.920 --> 1:24:40.400 justify it and the way they kind of like maybe 1:24:41.200 --> 1:24:45.120 misremember their motivations. Later, when he was asked about it, 1:24:45.600 --> 1:24:49.280 his reply was basically like, oh, I know, as I 1:24:49.360 --> 1:24:51.599 had plenty to eat and I always had money. 1:24:51.800 --> 1:24:54.360 Yeah, yeah, And that was during the that was So 1:24:54.560 --> 1:24:57.799 what's interesting about that is like during the Great Depression, 1:24:58.720 --> 1:25:01.680 you know, there's all these oral history projects, and so 1:25:01.840 --> 1:25:04.679 he was interviewed at the tail end of the Great Depression. 1:25:04.760 --> 1:25:07.599 He's still alive and he's lived through the Great Depression, 1:25:08.040 --> 1:25:09.760 and he's thinking about the Buffalo days and he's like, 1:25:09.800 --> 1:25:10.519 I don't know, it's. 1:25:11.160 --> 1:25:12.840 Pretty pretty good, a lot of meat. 1:25:12.960 --> 1:25:16.400 Yeah, I I what I said earlier contradat he was 1:25:16.680 --> 1:25:19.160 he was born to escaped slaves, So he was born 1:25:19.200 --> 1:25:21.960 in Michigan. His parents were both escape escaped slaves from 1:25:21.960 --> 1:25:22.320 the South. 1:25:22.680 --> 1:25:25.479 Yeah, the Buffalo soldiers play into this story a little bit, 1:25:25.520 --> 1:25:27.960 and we get into much greater detail in the project. 1:25:28.040 --> 1:25:32.360 But the the that term, you hear that term often, 1:25:32.439 --> 1:25:36.280 like even the what's his name Bob? The Bob Marley reference. 1:25:37.640 --> 1:25:38.280 I believe it was the. 1:25:38.280 --> 1:25:42.920 Commanche or Apache, I'm not I can't remember who likened 1:25:44.120 --> 1:25:48.520 the hair. They likened the hair of these black American 1:25:49.280 --> 1:25:51.200 cavalry members. They likened the hair to. 1:25:51.240 --> 1:25:53.400 The wool of a buffalo, so they would say they 1:25:53.439 --> 1:25:57.240 were a Buffalo soldier. Man. It became like a proud 1:25:58.120 --> 1:26:01.639 identity for a lot of these guys after the Civil War, 1:26:02.479 --> 1:26:05.040 Like they're they're out west, they're serving in the army 1:26:05.880 --> 1:26:09.120 and and yeah, it's like a really fascinating Eventually they 1:26:09.200 --> 1:26:11.520 come up to Yellowstone, they're in Montana. 1:26:11.800 --> 1:26:15.920 And they and they're having mix ups like they they're 1:26:16.240 --> 1:26:19.799 oftentimes during this little period that have them done. In Texas, 1:26:20.560 --> 1:26:25.799 Buffalo hide hunters are joining groups of Buffalo soldiers fighting 1:26:25.880 --> 1:26:27.200 against Comanche. Yeah. 1:26:27.960 --> 1:26:30.840 Yeah, the situation that maybe we should get into this 1:26:31.120 --> 1:26:34.759 like the phases of the hunt, Yeah, the three phases, 1:26:34.760 --> 1:26:39.280 because it starts in Kansas really along the tracks of 1:26:40.320 --> 1:26:43.320 of the railroads, the Topeka, Santa Fe in particular, Dodge 1:26:43.360 --> 1:26:47.439 City is like a big hub. And then the slaughter 1:26:47.560 --> 1:26:52.640 sort of goes on until there aren't any buffalo in 1:26:52.760 --> 1:26:56.799 Kansas anymore, and they the high hunters push into Texas, 1:26:57.760 --> 1:27:04.120 and Texas it becomes a much like at first they're 1:27:04.200 --> 1:27:06.920 so far away from any hub of settlement that they're 1:27:06.960 --> 1:27:10.040 still hauling the hauling the hides back up to Dodge City, 1:27:11.280 --> 1:27:15.320 but they're bumping into comanches and and there's a real 1:27:15.400 --> 1:27:17.760 recognition on the part of the comanches and other their 1:27:17.960 --> 1:27:22.160 their allies that the high hunters are killing off their 1:27:22.240 --> 1:27:26.200 economic lifeblood. And so it becomes sort of a very bloody, 1:27:27.520 --> 1:27:31.280 uh theater for the for the hide hunt, where high 1:27:31.360 --> 1:27:35.559 hunters sometimes are serving as sort of like proxy fighters 1:27:35.640 --> 1:27:38.559 for the US Army, and the army is serving as 1:27:38.600 --> 1:27:43.599 sort of proxy fighters for the buffalo hunters. And then 1:27:43.760 --> 1:27:46.040 at some point they kill all the buffalo in Texas 1:27:46.680 --> 1:27:49.880 and they roll up to Montana, and then Montana it's 1:27:49.960 --> 1:27:52.240 it's sort of a mop up job, and and in 1:27:52.320 --> 1:27:54.719 a couple of years the herds of the northern plains 1:27:54.760 --> 1:27:55.960 are basically blinked out. 1:27:56.560 --> 1:28:00.520 That that's a It's an interesting point about the Indigenous 1:28:00.560 --> 1:28:05.120 Americans that when we get into the deer skin trade, 1:28:05.400 --> 1:28:08.000 like in our long Hunter piece we focus on we 1:28:08.080 --> 1:28:12.160 focus really heavily on these Euro American, these white long hunters, 1:28:12.960 --> 1:28:15.559 but that the deer skin trade was really built by 1:28:15.680 --> 1:28:21.000 Native hunters before these guys like Boone and people started 1:28:21.000 --> 1:28:23.760 going into that area. There had been long a colonial 1:28:23.920 --> 1:28:27.320 trade in deer skins, and in the early days of 1:28:27.400 --> 1:28:29.720 that trade, those deer skins are being harvested by Native 1:28:29.720 --> 1:28:36.400 Americans and bought in and exported with the beaver skin trade. 1:28:36.760 --> 1:28:39.280 There were some tribes wanted nothing to do with the 1:28:39.320 --> 1:28:43.720 beaver skin trade. Other tribes jumped in pretty heavily, like 1:28:44.240 --> 1:28:46.639 the Flatheads were famous for having engaged in the beaver 1:28:46.720 --> 1:28:51.920 skin tribe trade. The Blackfeet. Some historians like to point 1:28:51.960 --> 1:28:54.400 out how the Blackfeet sat it out, but there's other 1:28:54.479 --> 1:28:58.040 accounts of the Blackfeet engaging pretty heavily and trading to 1:28:58.080 --> 1:29:03.000 the north. But they did it. The mountain men would 1:29:03.040 --> 1:29:06.280 often overwinter with tribes. A lot of mountain men were 1:29:06.360 --> 1:29:08.599 very tightly as so, like jim Bridge was very tightly 1:29:08.680 --> 1:29:13.120 associated with the Shoshone. Right, So there's this big Native 1:29:13.160 --> 1:29:17.040 American element of people in the trade, of people traveling 1:29:17.120 --> 1:29:21.600 with the practitioners. You get into the hide hunters and 1:29:22.360 --> 1:29:24.800 you don't find like. 1:29:25.040 --> 1:29:29.200 There's no cultural exchange, there's no sort of shared interests, 1:29:29.400 --> 1:29:30.519 there's no allies. 1:29:30.880 --> 1:29:30.920 No. 1:29:32.120 --> 1:29:33.719 As we get into it, we had a whole chapter. 1:29:33.840 --> 1:29:37.679 It kind of sets up this thing there was we're 1:29:37.680 --> 1:29:39.840 talking about when we talk about hide hunters. There was 1:29:39.880 --> 1:29:42.920 a thing called what we call the robe hunt or 1:29:43.000 --> 1:29:47.599 the robe trade. There was a commercial Native American trade, 1:29:47.720 --> 1:29:53.439 which was small scale and very artisan, for tanned buffalo 1:29:53.800 --> 1:29:59.200 robes that were used as an as an insulation. Like 1:29:59.280 --> 1:30:00.760 if you were on a way. You could be in 1:30:00.880 --> 1:30:03.160 Boston riding in a wagon on a cold day and 1:30:03.280 --> 1:30:05.920 you have a lap blanket that is a winter killed 1:30:06.520 --> 1:30:09.800 buffalo from the northern Plains. You could be in the 1:30:09.920 --> 1:30:12.719 military and be issued a sleeping bag on a polar 1:30:12.800 --> 1:30:17.759 expedition that could be a winter killed Indian tanned buffalo 1:30:17.920 --> 1:30:21.120 robe from the northern plans. So Indians would shoot buffalo 1:30:21.960 --> 1:30:24.400 at the right time of year and the right location, 1:30:25.800 --> 1:30:29.080 the women would tan it into a finished good, and 1:30:29.160 --> 1:30:30.920 that finished good was sold. 1:30:31.040 --> 1:30:36.120 But that was small and there's bottlenecks on there's natural 1:30:36.240 --> 1:30:38.920 constraints on the scale of that trade because of the 1:30:39.040 --> 1:30:42.640 seasonality and especially because of that labor part. Yeah, like 1:30:42.720 --> 1:30:44.479 a woman could tan ten a year. 1:30:44.640 --> 1:30:49.360 Yeah, a woman in addition to serving her family, preparing 1:30:49.479 --> 1:30:52.599 hides to clothe their family, working on hides to make 1:30:52.640 --> 1:30:58.120 a tent, she might be able to put out ten robes, 1:30:58.360 --> 1:30:59.400 yeah a year. 1:31:00.160 --> 1:31:01.120 A hide hunter. 1:31:03.400 --> 1:31:06.000 That's just hunting for skin, not tanned goods, but just 1:31:06.080 --> 1:31:09.160 hunting selling skin. A hide hunter, they would get into 1:31:09.360 --> 1:31:14.920 long periods where they are killing thirty and forty a day. 1:31:15.040 --> 1:31:17.439 There is examples of killing way more than that. We 1:31:17.560 --> 1:31:21.280 get into some of these extraordinary kills, but routinely, in 1:31:21.720 --> 1:31:27.120 good conditions, they're waking up every day and killing thirty 1:31:27.160 --> 1:31:31.840 to forty and a woman, a woman in a Native 1:31:31.840 --> 1:31:33.800 American family on the Great Plans, might be able to 1:31:33.800 --> 1:31:36.479 produce ten robes and annually. 1:31:36.640 --> 1:31:39.559 And like we said, the hide hunters are only drying 1:31:39.640 --> 1:31:42.960 the skins out and then they're being tanned on an 1:31:43.000 --> 1:31:46.720 industrial scale. In the East, there's sort of a bottomless 1:31:46.880 --> 1:31:51.679 appetite for buffalo skins, and there's really a bottomless appetite 1:31:51.720 --> 1:31:55.320 for leather at this time because the leather making industry, 1:31:55.360 --> 1:32:01.800 the tanning industry, has grown and consolidated and mechanized and 1:32:02.800 --> 1:32:06.320 made all these improvements and sort of process to the 1:32:06.400 --> 1:32:11.080 point that like it's basically like a big gaping maw, 1:32:11.280 --> 1:32:13.680 and as many hides as you can shovel into it, 1:32:13.800 --> 1:32:16.080 it can handle it, and it can find markets for them. 1:32:16.160 --> 1:32:19.840 So the tanning industry is just absorbing this on a 1:32:19.920 --> 1:32:23.000 scale that like native communities could not have during the 1:32:23.080 --> 1:32:23.720 robe trade era. 1:32:24.000 --> 1:32:28.840 Yeah, they're being tanned where you have a native woman 1:32:29.000 --> 1:32:32.439 tanning a buffalo hide with hand tools on the ground, 1:32:32.640 --> 1:32:36.320 using a buffalo's brain, okay, or a concoction of liver 1:32:36.439 --> 1:32:40.080 and brain to soften it when the hide hunters get going. 1:32:40.360 --> 1:32:44.640 Their skins are being tanned in railroad fed tanneries in 1:32:44.800 --> 1:32:49.479 buildings that are three hundred yards long by companies that 1:32:49.640 --> 1:32:53.080 own There's one company we talk about that owns twenty 1:32:53.200 --> 1:32:58.679 five thousand acres of timberland in Pennsylvania because they want 1:32:59.200 --> 1:33:02.880 tamarack and hemlock. They owned twenty five thousand acres of 1:33:03.000 --> 1:33:08.080 timberland to produce bark to make tannic acid. 1:33:08.400 --> 1:33:10.519 And this is a place like if you've heard the 1:33:10.600 --> 1:33:14.679 term of company town, where the company owns the store, 1:33:14.800 --> 1:33:17.240 the company owns the houses. You go there, you work 1:33:17.320 --> 1:33:19.519 for the factory, you go live in a house owned 1:33:19.560 --> 1:33:22.320 by the factory, and you buy your groceries from the factory. 1:33:23.400 --> 1:33:29.960 Like this is a company town in rural Pennsylvania that 1:33:30.920 --> 1:33:35.760 has nine story buildings where they're drying buffalo hides and 1:33:36.000 --> 1:33:38.640 they're tanning them these huge vats. They have rows of 1:33:38.760 --> 1:33:45.360 hundreds of vats, and yeah, like it's almost it's sort 1:33:45.400 --> 1:33:48.839 of startling when you see photos and these tanneries continue 1:33:48.880 --> 1:33:51.519 to operate even after the buffalo It was like when 1:33:51.560 --> 1:33:55.519 the buffalo hide trade was going on, they switched over 1:33:55.680 --> 1:34:00.559 to tanning, a majority of their business was buffalo skins, 1:34:00.920 --> 1:34:04.120 and then afterwards they simply switched back over to cattle skins. 1:34:04.240 --> 1:34:07.960 Yeah, that's a really one of the more fascinating points, 1:34:10.080 --> 1:34:15.000 like a discovery that I hadn't working on this. Oftentimes, 1:34:15.000 --> 1:34:17.160 when we go into these projects, like we're going to 1:34:17.240 --> 1:34:19.799 it with some level of pre awareness about the details, 1:34:19.840 --> 1:34:22.200 and we'll be able to like random and I can 1:34:22.240 --> 1:34:25.000 sit and we can kind of map out based on 1:34:25.160 --> 1:34:26.040 what we already know. 1:34:26.600 --> 1:34:27.920 We can kind of map out. 1:34:29.439 --> 1:34:32.200 How the story plays out, and we might come up 1:34:32.240 --> 1:34:33.840 with like we need to find out this or we 1:34:33.920 --> 1:34:35.519 need to learn why this is the way it is. 1:34:36.120 --> 1:34:38.440 But we come in with like some level of familiarity 1:34:40.160 --> 1:34:42.560 I and I kind of understand how I came to 1:34:42.640 --> 1:34:49.680 think this. Now I had thought from previous research and 1:34:49.920 --> 1:34:51.360 in fact, oh you know what I was gonna mention 1:34:53.200 --> 1:34:56.320 this story, like I wrote a book. 1:34:56.600 --> 1:34:59.280 I think it came out and so it was two 1:34:59.320 --> 1:34:59.880 thousand and eight. 1:35:00.600 --> 1:35:03.599 In two thousand and eight, I published a book, American 1:35:03.640 --> 1:35:05.599 Buffalo and Search of a Lost Icon. And it tells 1:35:05.640 --> 1:35:10.360 the story of the species from you know, the place, 1:35:10.400 --> 1:35:12.120 the scene. It tells the story of the species from 1:35:12.120 --> 1:35:15.519 the ice age up and into the future. It's this 1:35:15.760 --> 1:35:21.040 whole overview of the animal. There's a part of a 1:35:21.280 --> 1:35:25.640 chapter where I talk about the hide hunters. So have 1:35:25.720 --> 1:35:28.639 you ever seen like an exploded diagram where you're looking 1:35:28.720 --> 1:35:31.040 at like a piece of machinery, and then there's like 1:35:31.080 --> 1:35:33.360 a little arrow pointing to a part of the machinery, 1:35:33.400 --> 1:35:35.920 and on the next page is an exploded diagram of 1:35:36.000 --> 1:35:39.840 that little component. This is an exploded diagram of what 1:35:40.040 --> 1:35:43.439 is perhaps the most interesting part about that story, where 1:35:43.640 --> 1:35:46.680 this is taking that little that couple pages about the 1:35:46.760 --> 1:35:49.920 hide Hunters and American buffalo and blowing it out to 1:35:50.080 --> 1:35:57.360 something as long as the American buffalo. So there's if 1:35:57.400 --> 1:35:59.560 you've read that, and I know many of you have 1:36:00.080 --> 1:36:04.320 read that, there's like a little bits of overlapping stuff, 1:36:04.320 --> 1:36:08.240 But this is like a greatly this focus is on 1:36:08.360 --> 1:36:11.000 the most important stretch of a couple decades in that 1:36:11.160 --> 1:36:15.479 story and tells a very detailed accounting of something that 1:36:15.560 --> 1:36:19.200 I briefly gloss over in the book. But in that work, 1:36:19.439 --> 1:36:21.519 I had come to this thing, and you'll see it repeated, 1:36:21.560 --> 1:36:24.519 like I know where I got it, this idea that 1:36:24.720 --> 1:36:32.800 there was a invention, okay, or a revolutionary new process 1:36:33.840 --> 1:36:37.759 that all of a sudden made it so buffalo leather 1:36:38.680 --> 1:36:41.400 was like the greatest leather of all time. Okay. You'll 1:36:41.439 --> 1:36:44.400 see this, that they came up with news tanning methods 1:36:45.040 --> 1:36:47.800 and all of a sudden, lordy, lordie, you could make 1:36:47.960 --> 1:36:52.160 this great elastic belting out of buffalo hide, and buffalo 1:36:52.240 --> 1:36:58.519 hide was this super special leather. And that's not entirely wrong, 1:36:58.600 --> 1:36:59.439 but it's not quite right. 1:36:59.600 --> 1:37:03.719 You'll see that in every single thing, almost every single 1:37:03.760 --> 1:37:07.360 thing you read on the subjects, even like people writing 1:37:07.400 --> 1:37:11.200 in the eighteen nineties like William Temple Hornaday, like they 1:37:12.479 --> 1:37:16.280 they're saying, there's this Eureka moment where all of a sudden, 1:37:16.320 --> 1:37:20.519 there's value in buffalo leather and it goes It's like 1:37:20.560 --> 1:37:24.680 a boom and a bust, and that's just sort of 1:37:24.760 --> 1:37:28.760 accepted as fact. And I'd never read an explanation of 1:37:28.880 --> 1:37:32.519 what that was, and I really wanted to find that 1:37:33.360 --> 1:37:37.800 for this project. And we talked about this a lot, 1:37:38.000 --> 1:37:39.439 like we got to find that, We got to have 1:37:39.520 --> 1:37:42.880 that in there. Our audience is interested in tanning and 1:37:43.000 --> 1:37:45.840 working with skins and all this stuff. Like if there's 1:37:45.920 --> 1:37:49.000 one thing we need to have, it's that, and it 1:37:49.200 --> 1:37:51.400 just it doesn't really exist. 1:37:54.439 --> 1:37:56.479 You know, what would be a maybe perhaps a better 1:37:56.520 --> 1:38:00.840 way of thinking about what actually happened. What's that wood 1:38:00.880 --> 1:38:03.679 that everybody uses under decking? Now, it's like that composite wood. 1:38:05.479 --> 1:38:07.880 It's like chipped up. It's like chipped up wood with 1:38:08.200 --> 1:38:10.160 with with resins and adhesives. 1:38:12.280 --> 1:38:15.040 I don't know, like the fake wood. Okay, never mind 1:38:15.120 --> 1:38:21.040 that particleboard. Plywood, Yeah, plywood, Sure, everybody knows plywood. 1:38:21.360 --> 1:38:23.719 All right. Let's say you got a mill and they 1:38:23.760 --> 1:38:28.160 produce plywood, and because of where they're at, what trees 1:38:28.160 --> 1:38:30.960 they have available, they're producing tons of plywood, let's say, 1:38:31.040 --> 1:38:34.519 with white pine, and they develop this strategy and they 1:38:34.520 --> 1:38:36.519 can use white pine and they're making this really nice 1:38:36.560 --> 1:38:40.160 plywood and they're selling plywood like hotcakes. And all of 1:38:40.200 --> 1:38:42.160 a sudden, someone says, hey, man, you know how we're 1:38:42.240 --> 1:38:50.240 paying five dollars per unit of wood on white pine? 1:38:51.080 --> 1:38:55.840 Do you know that we can get ponderosa pine for 1:38:56.040 --> 1:38:59.519 three bucks? And so they go to their engineers, Hey, 1:38:59.560 --> 1:39:03.680 what happens when you use Ponderosa pine? And the engineers go, oh, 1:39:04.080 --> 1:39:07.280 you know, it turns out if you if you add 1:39:07.360 --> 1:39:11.280 a little more resin, it's the same thing. Man, like 1:39:11.439 --> 1:39:14.960 plywood's plywood. We could definitely use that Ponderosa pine. Uh. 1:39:15.240 --> 1:39:17.479 In fact, if it's three bucks and not five bucks, 1:39:17.920 --> 1:39:19.760 we'll take as much of that Ponderosa pine as we 1:39:19.760 --> 1:39:23.200 can get our hands on. Yeah, And they keep making plywood, 1:39:23.360 --> 1:39:26.080 and people keep buying plywood, and a lot of these 1:39:26.120 --> 1:39:28.040 people that are buying it, they wouldn't know white pine 1:39:28.080 --> 1:39:31.160 from ponderosa pine if they saw it. It's the product 1:39:31.240 --> 1:39:34.120 they want, and they're buying it. And then sometime down 1:39:34.160 --> 1:39:36.840 the road some guy goes, ah, you know what, the 1:39:36.920 --> 1:39:38.880 ponderosa pine they cut it all down. 1:39:39.040 --> 1:39:41.439 It's gone back to white pie. 1:39:41.760 --> 1:39:43.679 I guess we'll let's just keep running that white pine. 1:39:43.720 --> 1:39:46.479 That's great, is goodball lasting? 1:39:46.960 --> 1:39:47.200 Yeah? 1:39:47.320 --> 1:39:49.479 I mean it was like that's a better way of 1:39:49.600 --> 1:39:55.400 thinking about leather consumption because they were being like asiatic 1:39:55.479 --> 1:39:56.200 water buffalo. 1:39:56.560 --> 1:39:56.840 Sure. 1:39:57.160 --> 1:40:02.600 Yeah, the paddle from South America. Sure, the United sure 1:40:02.800 --> 1:40:03.880 buffalo hides, why not? 1:40:04.160 --> 1:40:07.400 Yeah, Like there's another there's the United States is importing 1:40:07.560 --> 1:40:10.880 leather anywhere it can't, or hides from anywhere it can, 1:40:11.040 --> 1:40:15.200 like sourcing hides, and all of a sudden, with the 1:40:15.360 --> 1:40:20.320 railroads they can access. However, many million hides are just 1:40:20.400 --> 1:40:22.560 sort of walking around out there on the planes and 1:40:22.640 --> 1:40:26.640 it can be sucked into this this pre existing you 1:40:26.720 --> 1:40:32.160 know network. And there's some truth to the idea that 1:40:32.240 --> 1:40:35.439 there's technological advances, like they're the the industry as a 1:40:35.479 --> 1:40:37.559 whole is getting better and better at working with big, 1:40:37.680 --> 1:40:43.719 heavy hides. There's some there's there's some changes in method 1:40:43.880 --> 1:40:48.200 where they're they're using hot water, like they're they're lining 1:40:48.280 --> 1:40:50.120 them and then doing a hot water bath. And there's 1:40:50.160 --> 1:40:53.320 actually a guy who calls that the buffalo method. But 1:40:53.400 --> 1:40:57.120 it's not. It wasn't invented for buffalo. It's just sort 1:40:57.120 --> 1:41:01.200 of like a gradual improvement and processes over time that 1:41:01.400 --> 1:41:06.519 happened to align with their ability to ship buffalo hides 1:41:06.600 --> 1:41:09.000 by the hundreds and thousands every year. 1:41:09.600 --> 1:41:13.479 Yeah. The challenge is if anybody that's skinned it deer 1:41:14.040 --> 1:41:18.000 knows that the belly right the belly's real thin. Yeah, 1:41:18.479 --> 1:41:20.960 the hides much thicker on either side of the backbone, 1:41:22.160 --> 1:41:24.000 you know, the inside of the legs is real thin, 1:41:24.520 --> 1:41:27.000 the hides real thick up on the neck. Whatever. The 1:41:27.200 --> 1:41:29.360 challenge is, how do you produce a uniform? How do 1:41:29.400 --> 1:41:31.520 you produce the biggest piece of uniform. 1:41:31.200 --> 1:41:31.840 Product you can? 1:41:32.360 --> 1:41:33.840 And so they're doing all this stuff like they're like 1:41:34.000 --> 1:41:39.080 they're they're like, imagine basically that you're sanding it down. 1:41:39.200 --> 1:41:41.960 And I think we just before that, I mean we're talking. 1:41:42.360 --> 1:41:43.880 I don't think we've mentioned yet belting. 1:41:44.040 --> 1:41:45.680 No, we have a tub of where all this like 1:41:45.880 --> 1:41:50.560 why yeah, yeah, the country had always used leather. The 1:41:50.680 --> 1:41:53.760 number one thing we want a leather for shoes. Yeah, Like, 1:41:53.920 --> 1:41:58.760 let shoes were leather, tack, horse equipment, harness equipment, all 1:41:58.800 --> 1:42:00.400 that stuff was made out of leather. But and all 1:42:00.439 --> 1:42:02.240 of a sudden they. 1:42:02.200 --> 1:42:08.160 Need belting, which is like if you picture if you 1:42:08.240 --> 1:42:12.080 picture a timing belt on your snow machine or whatever 1:42:12.200 --> 1:42:15.280 in your car, Like a belt is simply something that, 1:42:15.880 --> 1:42:18.679 at the most basic level, takes movement from one place 1:42:19.080 --> 1:42:22.760 and transfers that movement to something else. Right, So one 1:42:22.800 --> 1:42:26.559 thing spins, the belt spins through it and the other 1:42:26.720 --> 1:42:31.560 side spins that. Yeah, does that make sense? And so 1:42:31.640 --> 1:42:34.040 if you imagine like a very early factory, it's all 1:42:34.280 --> 1:42:37.200 it's all gears and cogs either made out of wood 1:42:37.280 --> 1:42:41.400 or metal, and you're taking power from a stream like 1:42:41.479 --> 1:42:43.719 a like a You've got a water wheel and a stream, 1:42:43.800 --> 1:42:46.479 and the wheel's turning and that's turning a big shaft 1:42:46.560 --> 1:42:49.800 that's turning a gear that's turning another shaft until it 1:42:49.880 --> 1:42:52.519 gets to wherever you're doing the work with that power, 1:42:53.040 --> 1:42:56.720 whether it's like a grinding mill or you know, you 1:42:56.760 --> 1:42:59.160 can power a saw with that. You could power any 1:42:59.240 --> 1:43:02.920 sorts of other like mechanical tools with that power. But 1:43:03.000 --> 1:43:06.080 it all has to be transmitted through One thing moves, 1:43:06.120 --> 1:43:08.719 another thing moves, and other thing moves another thing moves, 1:43:09.160 --> 1:43:12.680 because they can't just zap it down a wire like 1:43:12.760 --> 1:43:16.719 in the age of electricity. And so the leather belt 1:43:17.479 --> 1:43:23.799 replaces this older system of shafts and cogs and wheels 1:43:23.920 --> 1:43:27.519 and things like that. And it's revolutionary because you can 1:43:27.640 --> 1:43:33.800 spread power out across a factory floor in all types 1:43:33.840 --> 1:43:35.840 of different directions, and you can spread it out to 1:43:35.920 --> 1:43:39.879 different machines or whatever. And this is something that's invented 1:43:40.040 --> 1:43:43.200 in America the leather belt drive, and then it's sort 1:43:43.240 --> 1:43:45.920 of perfected during the Civil War as like there's this 1:43:46.080 --> 1:43:50.240 increase in wartime manufacturing, and so that coincides again with 1:43:51.080 --> 1:43:55.280 the railroads reach the planes. The buffalo can be shipped east. 1:43:55.439 --> 1:43:59.040 The tanning factories are ready to absorb the buffalo, and 1:43:59.200 --> 1:44:02.360 there's this, I mean, we're talking about miles and miles 1:44:02.439 --> 1:44:04.360 and miles of belting in a factory. 1:44:04.520 --> 1:44:07.320 Yeah, there's a photo from after the buffalo hide era. 1:44:07.479 --> 1:44:10.560 And again they used that leather when it was available, 1:44:11.120 --> 1:44:13.800 but the wiping out the buffalo didn't wipe out leather. 1:44:14.400 --> 1:44:18.400 So there's a photo from the Ford plant. Yeah, the 1:44:18.600 --> 1:44:23.280 lathing operation for like the drive shafts at a Ford plant. Yeah, 1:44:23.960 --> 1:44:26.800 And the caption on the photo points out that what 1:44:26.920 --> 1:44:30.800 you're looking at is fifty miles. It's just a picture 1:44:30.840 --> 1:44:33.280 a bunch of people in a factory, all dressed in 1:44:33.320 --> 1:44:36.960 black and white. As a joke. A bunch of people 1:44:37.000 --> 1:44:37.880 at a factory. 1:44:37.640 --> 1:44:38.360 I'll talking like that. 1:44:40.560 --> 1:44:45.960 Standing at equipment and over their heads is nothing butt belting. Yeah, 1:44:46.160 --> 1:44:50.120 Because somewhere is a big steam engine running and they're 1:44:50.200 --> 1:44:53.840 transmitting power to all these lathes. And it says you're 1:44:53.880 --> 1:44:57.080 looking at fifty miles of leather belting, but some of 1:44:57.160 --> 1:44:59.960 this leather belting is ten feet wide. 1:45:00.280 --> 1:45:04.240 Yeah, yeah, And that's so if you picture an old 1:45:04.439 --> 1:45:07.000 like if you've ever seen a drawing of an old factory, 1:45:08.120 --> 1:45:11.960 there's all these people working at machines in neat little rows, 1:45:12.920 --> 1:45:19.160 and overhead there's a bunch of stuff and there's lines 1:45:19.280 --> 1:45:22.320 coming down to their machines, and it almost looks like 1:45:22.640 --> 1:45:25.880 like a puppet theater, right, And so essentially, the way 1:45:25.960 --> 1:45:28.400 that before the age of electricity, the way that this 1:45:28.600 --> 1:45:31.920 worked is you had a steam engine and that's turning 1:45:31.960 --> 1:45:34.880 a huge belt, and that's called the prime mover of 1:45:34.920 --> 1:45:37.600 the factory. Like the steam engine begins moving things, and 1:45:37.640 --> 1:45:41.520 then that belt moves these long shafts that are suspended 1:45:42.439 --> 1:45:48.080 in parallel rows above the factory floor. Those shafts then 1:45:48.160 --> 1:45:51.439 are linked together by belts so that when one turns, 1:45:51.520 --> 1:45:54.560 they all turn. So you have the prime mover, and 1:45:54.680 --> 1:45:58.120 that's moving a big belt that turns one of these shafts, 1:45:58.160 --> 1:46:00.000 and then that shaft is turning all the other shafts, 1:46:00.640 --> 1:46:04.040 and then each individual machine is connected to those moving 1:46:04.160 --> 1:46:09.280 shafts on the ceiling by more belts and if you're 1:46:09.320 --> 1:46:11.640 going to do something at a machine, you essentially have 1:46:11.760 --> 1:46:14.200 like a clutch like in your car, because the whole 1:46:14.280 --> 1:46:17.680 thing is moving continuously, like the things above your moving continuously. 1:46:18.000 --> 1:46:19.280 So if you're all of a sudden, I need to 1:46:19.880 --> 1:46:23.400 use my saw or my hammer or my mill or 1:46:23.479 --> 1:46:26.040 whatever it is, you have like a foot pedal that 1:46:26.160 --> 1:46:28.760 sort of clutches that timing belt onto your machine. And 1:46:28.840 --> 1:46:32.120 now your machine's running, and to stop it you disengage 1:46:32.160 --> 1:46:34.400 it from the belt again with that with that clutch, and. 1:46:34.479 --> 1:46:37.360 That power is always cranking, and they're even running primary 1:46:37.400 --> 1:46:38.880 belts into other buildings. 1:46:38.640 --> 1:46:41.439 Yeah, to other buildings. And if you think about it, 1:46:41.560 --> 1:46:45.479 like today, if you have a big manufacturing operation, every 1:46:45.560 --> 1:46:49.640 place you need an outlet or an extension cord before electricity, 1:46:50.080 --> 1:46:53.080 that all has to be connected physically by moving things. 1:46:53.360 --> 1:46:57.000 Like if you want to move whatever, a rock crusher, 1:46:57.960 --> 1:47:01.439 it has to be connected by moving parts to moving 1:47:01.520 --> 1:47:04.240 parts to moving parts to the steam engine or whatever 1:47:04.439 --> 1:47:07.840 is generating your power there. So like when we think 1:47:07.840 --> 1:47:11.560 about the expansion of the industrial economy, like in the 1:47:11.640 --> 1:47:16.879 eighteen seventies, eighties, nineties, it's all predicated on the ability 1:47:16.960 --> 1:47:20.720 of belts to connect machines to steam engines, and so 1:47:20.840 --> 1:47:26.800 that's like it's almost this bottomless demand for leather, and 1:47:26.920 --> 1:47:30.200 buffalo leather does lend itself well to this because of 1:47:30.280 --> 1:47:33.880 its inherent properties. But as Steve pointed out, like the 1:47:34.960 --> 1:47:37.479 Ford is still using leather belts in the nineteen twenties 1:47:37.600 --> 1:47:39.840 and they're not taking them from buffalo like you could have. 1:47:40.680 --> 1:47:43.840 You know, it's not like if we hadn't had buffalo leather, 1:47:43.920 --> 1:47:46.679 we couldn't have built these factories. Buffalo leather just happened 1:47:46.680 --> 1:47:49.240 to sort of fall into the shoot at the right time. 1:47:49.800 --> 1:47:52.880 What kind of feeds this idea of some specific thing 1:47:53.040 --> 1:47:56.160 triggering it? Is this? There's this There is a story 1:47:56.760 --> 1:48:01.120 that comes out of the Kansas Planes and it's very 1:48:01.160 --> 1:48:04.559 well documented and it's a really interesting narrative of how 1:48:04.640 --> 1:48:11.240 this played out. Is a tannery has a desire to 1:48:11.560 --> 1:48:16.799 experiment with some buffalo skins. So they call like a broker, 1:48:17.000 --> 1:48:19.240 a guy that deals in buffalo meet and other things 1:48:19.960 --> 1:48:23.439 out in Kansas, and they're like, hey, we'd like to 1:48:23.520 --> 1:48:25.720 get five hundred hides to mess with. 1:48:27.600 --> 1:48:28.280 He's not a hunter. 1:48:29.080 --> 1:48:32.320 He goes to one of these railroad meat hunters and 1:48:32.400 --> 1:48:37.120 says to a railroad meat hunter. Hey, can you get 1:48:37.200 --> 1:48:37.960 me the five hundred? 1:48:38.640 --> 1:48:38.760 Hi. 1:48:38.920 --> 1:48:41.040 So here's a guy. He takes the order, he needs 1:48:41.080 --> 1:48:43.960 to find someone to fulfill the order. He contracts a guy, 1:48:44.560 --> 1:48:46.719 a meat hunter, to fulfill his order for five hundred. 1:48:46.720 --> 1:48:48.920 The meat hunter shoots I think five hundred and fifty one, 1:48:51.200 --> 1:48:53.400 turns the five hundred into the guy that bought him 1:48:53.439 --> 1:48:55.400 for him, but he's got this extra fifty to burn 1:48:56.720 --> 1:49:01.160 sends the extra fifty to a brother and austin New York, 1:49:01.400 --> 1:49:05.280 sorry New York. But the buyer who then sold, yeah, 1:49:05.960 --> 1:49:08.960 sends the other fifty to a brother who then's like, well, 1:49:09.000 --> 1:49:12.120 I'll go try to find someone that wants them. He 1:49:12.320 --> 1:49:15.120 sells them to a tannery. So now you have two 1:49:15.240 --> 1:49:18.360 tanneries that are sitting on some There's a tannery sitting 1:49:18.400 --> 1:49:20.840 at about five hundred. There's a tannery sitting at about fifty. 1:49:21.800 --> 1:49:26.280 Both of these tanneries mess around with the hides and 1:49:26.479 --> 1:49:30.559 both come back and say, we'd like a lot. 1:49:30.720 --> 1:49:32.599 Gimme Elia gott we'd like a lot. 1:49:33.400 --> 1:49:37.320 And that starts it. Yeah, that is it is a 1:49:37.760 --> 1:49:41.960 very distinct like beginning. Yeah, that broadus's the beginning. 1:49:42.000 --> 1:49:44.840 That brother in New York as soon as he sells 1:49:44.880 --> 1:49:47.840 them and the company says, we want two thousand more 1:49:47.920 --> 1:49:50.160 and probably more. After that, he just gets on a 1:49:50.240 --> 1:49:53.280 train to Kansas and he finds his brother in Dodge City. 1:49:53.320 --> 1:49:56.720 He said, this is just the business now. Yep, it's 1:49:56.800 --> 1:49:58.720 game on. Yeah, yeah, it's game on. 1:49:59.560 --> 1:50:01.880 And it caught. It happened so fast that it caught 1:50:01.960 --> 1:50:07.000 meat hunters by surprise. There's hide hunters that talk about that. 1:50:07.240 --> 1:50:11.720 There's hide hunters that like, remember the day they they 1:50:11.840 --> 1:50:15.720 got the news. Yeah, like the day they got the 1:50:15.800 --> 1:50:17.040 news where people are like, no, no, no, no, no, no, 1:50:17.880 --> 1:50:19.160 it's the hides dummy. 1:50:19.240 --> 1:50:21.240 Yeah. There's a guy. There's a guy who's out shooting 1:50:21.320 --> 1:50:23.880 meat and he's complaining to some other hunters that it's 1:50:23.960 --> 1:50:26.360 too hot out because all of his meat's spoiling before 1:50:26.400 --> 1:50:28.439 he could sell it. And they look at him and 1:50:28.439 --> 1:50:30.840 they're like, why are you still hunting for meat? You 1:50:30.920 --> 1:50:34.200 could just screak me, take the hides off, and bring 1:50:34.320 --> 1:50:36.320 him to here and it'll buy everyone he can bring him. 1:50:36.840 --> 1:50:40.320 And he he's like dumbfounded. He because he's still out 1:50:40.360 --> 1:50:43.919 there trying to cure hams and stuff on the planes 1:50:43.960 --> 1:50:47.360 and and sort of his the world has moved past that. 1:50:48.680 --> 1:50:51.760 Uh, another one this kind of this is the last 1:50:52.000 --> 1:50:56.040 part of this that we'll get into right now. Uh, 1:50:57.640 --> 1:51:03.880 there is if you study this area this, if you 1:51:03.960 --> 1:51:08.479 study this era on like a superficial level, you'll always 1:51:08.640 --> 1:51:14.400 find out about all the waste and without wanting to 1:51:18.280 --> 1:51:22.280 without wanting to do a sort of revisionist history. You know, 1:51:23.880 --> 1:51:28.240 let me better explain what I'm saying. The hide hunters 1:51:28.320 --> 1:51:31.920 waste the enormous quantities of meat. But there's more to 1:51:32.040 --> 1:51:32.400 the story. 1:51:33.120 --> 1:51:33.400 Okay. 1:51:34.800 --> 1:51:38.840 You could picture someone coming to this, depending on their motivations, 1:51:38.960 --> 1:51:41.520 you could picture someone coming to this and saying. 1:51:41.439 --> 1:51:43.320 Like, it's all a lie. 1:51:43.720 --> 1:51:46.320 They didn't waste all that meat. They sold a lot 1:51:46.400 --> 1:51:49.040 of meat. Like, they sold a lot of meat. And 1:51:49.520 --> 1:51:52.400 as we gotten into this for like, let me tell 1:51:52.400 --> 1:51:56.800 you two things that are real true. Man, they sold 1:51:56.800 --> 1:52:02.360 a lot of meat, but man, they wasted a lot, 1:52:03.160 --> 1:52:07.479 a lot, a lot more. Yeah, you could get into, 1:52:07.600 --> 1:52:09.560 like we get into all the numbers on this, you 1:52:09.640 --> 1:52:15.760 can get into what seems like staggering quantities of sold meat. 1:52:17.120 --> 1:52:21.400 When you get into the tonnages, like the counts on tongues, 1:52:22.160 --> 1:52:29.600 the barrels of tongues, the trainloads of meat, right, the 1:52:29.920 --> 1:52:32.560 vast quantities of smoked hams. 1:52:32.360 --> 1:52:34.599 And they talk about it a lot, and you'd look 1:52:34.800 --> 1:52:40.880 and be like, my god, strain resourceful train cars full 1:52:40.920 --> 1:52:44.200 of meat, right, And you could spend this whole narrative 1:52:44.200 --> 1:52:49.679 about all this meat, or you can start going like, okay, 1:52:49.840 --> 1:52:50.759 let's start trying. 1:52:50.600 --> 1:52:53.000 To do a little math. Let's do a little math. 1:52:54.600 --> 1:52:56.920 Like here's a guy. And these guys had meticulous records 1:52:56.960 --> 1:52:59.479 because they're getting receipts when they sell this stuff. Like 1:53:00.080 --> 1:53:02.080 the receipts are out there be like, you know, a 1:53:02.160 --> 1:53:05.400 receipt to Bob, but it's like what Bob got for 1:53:05.560 --> 1:53:07.960 his cow hides for his bull hides for his kIPS 1:53:08.080 --> 1:53:10.599 or calf hides for his meat, and like how many 1:53:10.680 --> 1:53:12.000 pounds of meat and what perr? 1:53:12.720 --> 1:53:12.880 You know. 1:53:13.280 --> 1:53:15.640 It's like these are like we are very much like 1:53:15.720 --> 1:53:18.559 we talked with long hunters. A lot of the information 1:53:18.600 --> 1:53:20.800 about the long hunters is because a historian later went 1:53:20.840 --> 1:53:23.360 and talked to their grandkid and he's like, no, I 1:53:23.520 --> 1:53:26.040 swear grandpa said that he got two dollars for his 1:53:26.120 --> 1:53:28.360 deer hides or whatever, you know, and that becomes like 1:53:29.200 --> 1:53:32.040 the historic record some dude's recollection about what his dad 1:53:32.080 --> 1:53:34.439 told him or his grandpa told him. Here, it's like 1:53:35.560 --> 1:53:38.760 there's too much material. There's tons of material. So you 1:53:38.800 --> 1:53:42.000 can get into these staggering quantities of meat that really does. 1:53:42.400 --> 1:53:44.040 But then you get into like, let's look at it 1:53:44.120 --> 1:53:48.400 as percentages, you know, and when you start looking at 1:53:48.520 --> 1:53:50.800 certain outfits and this is just the outfits that did 1:53:50.920 --> 1:53:53.120 sell me. Plenty of outfits didn't sell me. When you 1:53:53.160 --> 1:53:56.120 get into the outfits that did sell meat and you 1:53:56.200 --> 1:54:00.639 start looking at their numbers, it's like, man, they sold 1:54:00.680 --> 1:54:02.920 a lot of meat, but like it seems like about 1:54:03.120 --> 1:54:08.080 ninety nine percent it's wasted. Like be like, okay, so 1:54:08.160 --> 1:54:12.840 they're selling about six pounds. Yeah, they're selling maybe like 1:54:12.960 --> 1:54:16.680 if you look at his whole hide hole and then 1:54:16.720 --> 1:54:20.439 you look at his meat receipts, you're like, okay, he's 1:54:20.479 --> 1:54:23.000 selling about six pounds per animal. 1:54:25.960 --> 1:54:30.000 But at the same time, at six pounds an animals, 1:54:30.120 --> 1:54:34.240 he's selling ten twenty thousand pounds of meat in a year. 1:54:34.440 --> 1:54:37.960 Yeah. So it's just like it's a real roller coaster 1:54:38.160 --> 1:54:40.200 because you're going to like, ah, they wasted all the meat. 1:54:40.280 --> 1:54:42.120 Then you get into this like holy cow, they sold 1:54:42.120 --> 1:54:44.440 a lot of meat, and you're like, wait a minute, 1:54:44.560 --> 1:54:45.920 they wasted a lot of meat. 1:54:46.760 --> 1:54:48.960 But again it's like the reason they did this is 1:54:49.040 --> 1:54:53.200 to make money. And so wherever they could squeeze a 1:54:53.240 --> 1:54:56.240 little extra profit or a little extra revenue to get 1:54:56.280 --> 1:54:59.560 the stuff that they needed or tuck little money like 1:54:59.640 --> 1:55:03.720 away for a slow season, like if they could, if 1:55:03.760 --> 1:55:06.320 they could halt some meat to a to a railroad 1:55:06.360 --> 1:55:08.240 pretty easily, they did it. You know, if they're hunting 1:55:08.280 --> 1:55:10.720 in super remote areas, they're not trading and meat, but 1:55:10.880 --> 1:55:13.240 like if you can get an extra couple bucks off 1:55:13.280 --> 1:55:16.840 an animal by by curing its hands and hump and stuff, 1:55:16.960 --> 1:55:18.000 like they did that. 1:55:18.280 --> 1:55:18.560 And so. 1:55:20.120 --> 1:55:23.920 There's it's a there's a real complicated explanation of it all. 1:55:24.240 --> 1:55:27.920 But yeah, here's here's an interesting piece of this, this 1:55:28.120 --> 1:55:32.160 kind of show, like the the hard scrabble nature, but 1:55:32.320 --> 1:55:39.560 also the uh a kind of persnickety quality of these 1:55:39.640 --> 1:55:43.760 individuals when it comes to or like a penny pinching 1:55:43.920 --> 1:55:48.040 kind of miserly quality to like the economics. There was 1:55:48.120 --> 1:55:52.640 a product that came from the buffalo that was a 1:55:52.720 --> 1:55:57.120 stuffing of mattress stuffing material and it was if you 1:55:57.200 --> 1:55:59.680 picture the forehead on a buffalo is called the mop 1:56:00.320 --> 1:56:04.720 okay that had value, and it was used to stuff mattresses, 1:56:05.640 --> 1:56:11.240 stuff of polstery. It was hard to get out, hard 1:56:11.280 --> 1:56:13.360 to pull out, Like they didn't want the mop's skin, 1:56:13.480 --> 1:56:16.520 they just wanted the hair and bags. So these hide 1:56:16.600 --> 1:56:18.640 hunters like you couldn't pull it. But if anyone is 1:56:18.720 --> 1:56:20.720 dealt with animals a lot, you know that we have 1:56:20.800 --> 1:56:23.760 a term when the hair starts to slip. Like fire 1:56:23.840 --> 1:56:25.920 your picture, you're walking along the bank of a river 1:56:26.040 --> 1:56:28.760 and you see a deer and he's like, you know, 1:56:29.640 --> 1:56:32.200 dead on the side of the river, drown on the 1:56:32.280 --> 1:56:35.040 river and washed out, and you go grab a handful 1:56:35.080 --> 1:56:35.840 of hair on that thing. 1:56:35.920 --> 1:56:37.680 What happens when you grab a handful of that hair 1:56:37.720 --> 1:56:39.840 and pull comes right out, comes right. 1:56:40.440 --> 1:56:42.920 It's called the hair is slipping. So in the high 1:56:43.000 --> 1:56:46.400 trade even today, the worst thing. Talk to your tax 1:56:46.480 --> 1:56:49.680 nermost if you're bringing in a deer cape, if you're 1:56:49.720 --> 1:56:52.720 trying to sell a skunk hide, it doesn't matter. Hair 1:56:52.880 --> 1:56:57.680 slippage means too late, it's rotten. Like if you go 1:56:57.760 --> 1:56:59.600 to your tax nermous with a bear rug or a 1:56:59.680 --> 1:57:01.680 deer cape and he grabs a tough to that hair 1:57:01.720 --> 1:57:03.960 and pulls, and half the hair in his hand comes free, 1:57:04.600 --> 1:57:08.000 just you messed up. Yeah, it's slipping. It's no good. 1:57:09.280 --> 1:57:11.640 They would at times when there's nothing else to do, 1:57:12.000 --> 1:57:14.440 they would wait till all these like when they skin 1:57:14.520 --> 1:57:16.200 the carcass, as we explained how they skin them. When 1:57:16.200 --> 1:57:18.800 they skin the carcass, they'd stop behind the ears. So 1:57:19.120 --> 1:57:22.040 a buffalo hide went to the market is missing, it's 1:57:22.080 --> 1:57:25.040 missing its face, it's cut off behind the ears. They 1:57:25.080 --> 1:57:28.720 would wait till the carcasses rotten enough that the hair 1:57:28.760 --> 1:57:31.040 would start to slip, and then they would go back 1:57:31.160 --> 1:57:36.920 out into the field and pull mops and stuff it 1:57:37.040 --> 1:57:37.760 into sacks. 1:57:38.240 --> 1:57:40.560 When they're good and rotten, meaning. 1:57:41.720 --> 1:57:45.560 Where there's money to be made. They were there to 1:57:45.600 --> 1:57:52.040 make the money. It's just at times it's like it's 1:57:52.120 --> 1:57:54.840 just it wasn't efficient, but you could. It's it's really 1:57:54.920 --> 1:57:57.520 hard to look at their lives and point out places 1:57:57.560 --> 1:58:02.280 where you're lazy. Yeah, Like this wasn't like a laziness thing. 1:58:02.720 --> 1:58:07.760 It was just business man. It was business. It was business. 1:58:08.280 --> 1:58:15.120 Yeah. And on top of that, not to not to 1:58:15.240 --> 1:58:18.680 get into more details, but there's all kinds of wild 1:58:18.800 --> 1:58:22.440 stories in this, just like the weird you know, people 1:58:22.520 --> 1:58:26.600 getting charged by buffalo, people getting pounded in hailstorms, people 1:58:26.680 --> 1:58:31.720 getting killed, people finding bodies, people doing really weird stuff, 1:58:31.840 --> 1:58:34.920 people eating weird stuff, people playing pranks on each other, 1:58:35.120 --> 1:58:38.040 dying weird ways, dying in weird ways. We got a guy. 1:58:38.120 --> 1:58:42.320 We have a big section about all the people killed 1:58:42.320 --> 1:58:48.360 by buffaloes that they wounded. We're working on an animation project. Anyways, 1:58:48.400 --> 1:58:54.240 there's a guy who shoots a buffalo, gets up through 1:58:54.240 --> 1:58:57.160 it's still alive, pulls out his pistol to finish it off. 1:58:58.120 --> 1:59:00.560 As he pulls out his pistol, the buffalo jumps up 1:59:01.080 --> 1:59:04.320 and starts coming for him. He really quickly tries to 1:59:04.400 --> 1:59:06.520 mount his horse to get away, and in mounting us 1:59:06.560 --> 1:59:08.520 because he's got his pistol out now and it's cocked. 1:59:09.240 --> 1:59:12.160 In mounting his horse, he has a negligent discharge and 1:59:12.320 --> 1:59:17.919 shoots his own horse. So now the horse takes off wounded. 1:59:18.840 --> 1:59:21.840 The buffalo is wounded, chasing the horse, and then both 1:59:21.880 --> 1:59:23.480 the horse and the buffalo. 1:59:23.280 --> 1:59:26.440 Die and he walks walks away. 1:59:28.360 --> 1:59:31.280 Other guys, other hide hunters, they go miss him. This 1:59:31.440 --> 1:59:33.320 is the kind of we give a handful of these 1:59:34.320 --> 1:59:39.600 stories that play out very similarly. Bob is off hunting, 1:59:41.960 --> 1:59:45.000 Bob don't come home at night. In the morning, you 1:59:45.120 --> 1:59:47.960 go looking for Bob and lo and behold, there's a 1:59:48.040 --> 1:59:51.120 dead buffalo laying there, and there's a dead Bob laying 1:59:51.160 --> 1:59:57.000 next to it. Yeah, and Bob is in bad shape. 1:59:57.080 --> 1:59:59.680 It turns out that when you shoot buffalo by the dozens, 2:00:00.320 --> 2:00:03.120 you make some bad shots and you end up encountering 2:00:03.160 --> 2:00:04.000 some angry buffalo. 2:00:04.200 --> 2:00:06.760 Yep, and Bob is badly bruised. 2:00:06.920 --> 2:00:14.680 Yeah. Anyhow, me Inter's American. 2:00:14.400 --> 2:00:20.840 History, The Hide Hunters eighteen sixty five to eighteen eighty three. 2:00:20.920 --> 2:00:23.760 We never explained eighteen eighty three. So you know, when 2:00:24.000 --> 2:00:25.560 you hear an interview with an author and they don't 2:00:25.560 --> 2:00:28.720 want to tell the end, Well, you're in the end. 2:00:28.760 --> 2:00:31.680 You're like, so did they catch them? They're like, well, 2:00:31.720 --> 2:00:34.880 I'm not gonna tell. Does he die in the end? 2:00:35.440 --> 2:00:36.240 I'm not gonna tell. 2:00:37.400 --> 2:00:41.160 Well, oh you can do this. Do the buffalo die 2:00:41.240 --> 2:00:41.640 in the end? 2:00:42.360 --> 2:00:42.560 Yes? 2:00:42.680 --> 2:00:47.720 But what year not telling? Not telling? 2:00:49.320 --> 2:00:53.080 I let out to my I'm a huge fury Road 2:00:53.120 --> 2:00:58.120 and Furiosa fan. I let out to my daughter early 2:00:58.240 --> 2:01:00.760 on in furios that her boyfrid friend doesn't make it 2:01:00.840 --> 2:01:02.800 through to the end. She was very upset with me 2:01:02.880 --> 2:01:05.640 for letting that leak. So I hope you're not watching 2:01:05.680 --> 2:01:11.000 that one can leave that out till thanks for joining me. 2:01:11.160 --> 2:01:14.920 There's American history, of course, go back the Long Hunters, 2:01:15.920 --> 2:01:19.080 then check out The Mountain Men, and then dig into 2:01:19.120 --> 2:01:22.360 the new one available now, The Hide Hunters eighteen sixty 2:01:22.440 --> 2:01:26.000 five to eighteen eighty three. We were going to talk 2:01:26.040 --> 2:01:28.240 about what's next, or we're going to talk about how 2:01:28.280 --> 2:01:32.440 we're trying to decide what's next, but wait and see. 2:01:32.560 --> 2:01:34.200 When it happens, we will tell you about it. Thank 2:01:34.200 --> 2:01:35.520 you very much for listening.