1 00:00:03,400 --> 00:00:14,960 Speaker 1: This is an I Heart original. On March, the warden 2 00:00:15,080 --> 00:00:21,919 Speaker 1: of England's Royal Mint received a letter most merciful Sir, 3 00:00:23,200 --> 00:00:26,920 Speaker 1: I am going to be murdered. Perhaps you don't think so, 4 00:00:27,440 --> 00:00:32,040 Speaker 1: but it's true. I shall be murdered, and the worst 5 00:00:32,080 --> 00:00:35,120 Speaker 1: of all, I will be murdered in the face of 6 00:00:35,240 --> 00:00:41,879 Speaker 1: justice unless I am rescued by your merciful hearts. The 7 00:00:42,000 --> 00:00:45,840 Speaker 1: letter was an appeal to the warden's conscience. It went 8 00:00:45,920 --> 00:00:52,520 Speaker 1: on my offending you has brought this upon me. Nobody 9 00:00:52,560 --> 00:00:56,800 Speaker 1: can save me but you. I how God will move 10 00:00:56,880 --> 00:01:00,200 Speaker 1: your heart with mercy and pity to do this thing 11 00:01:00,320 --> 00:01:15,720 Speaker 1: for me. It was signed You're near murdered, Humble Servant. W. W. 12 00:01:15,959 --> 00:01:19,119 Speaker 1: Chaloner was one William Chaloner, a con man who at 13 00:01:19,160 --> 00:01:23,400 Speaker 1: one time had been the most successful counterfeit coinmaker London 14 00:01:23,440 --> 00:01:30,840 Speaker 1: had ever seen. But now he was awaiting execution at 15 00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:34,760 Speaker 1: Newgate Jail, the stinking hell hole of a prison built 16 00:01:34,800 --> 00:01:37,560 Speaker 1: into the ancient Roman wall of the city of London. 17 00:01:39,880 --> 00:01:43,120 Speaker 1: The warden, whose job it was to track down counterfeiters, 18 00:01:43,280 --> 00:01:46,760 Speaker 1: and who had hunted Challenger for years, never bothered to 19 00:01:46,920 --> 00:02:01,920 Speaker 1: right back. Two days after he wrote that letter, Chaloner 20 00:02:02,080 --> 00:02:04,720 Speaker 1: was dragged from the jail through more than two miles 21 00:02:04,840 --> 00:02:09,160 Speaker 1: of London's foul, mud filled streets to the Tyburn Tree. 22 00:02:10,720 --> 00:02:13,600 Speaker 1: This was not an actual tree, but rather the name 23 00:02:13,680 --> 00:02:16,080 Speaker 1: given to the wooden gallows erected at the site of 24 00:02:16,080 --> 00:02:19,120 Speaker 1: the Tyburn Brook that was now Marble Arch in London. 25 00:02:20,040 --> 00:02:22,920 Speaker 1: This would have been an open space, a field, and 26 00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:27,760 Speaker 1: on hanging days, behaving mass of humans, all clamoring to 27 00:02:27,840 --> 00:02:36,280 Speaker 1: watch the bad guys die. Challoner arrived at the gallows filthy, 28 00:02:36,520 --> 00:02:39,360 Speaker 1: splattered with mud and whatever else had been thrown at 29 00:02:39,400 --> 00:02:43,280 Speaker 1: him along the way. He was terrified, he was angry, 30 00:02:43,800 --> 00:02:46,760 Speaker 1: and he was sober. By now, after months of living 31 00:02:46,760 --> 00:02:48,919 Speaker 1: in Newgate, he didn't even have enough money to buy 32 00:02:48,919 --> 00:02:53,040 Speaker 1: a swallow of gin. In his hands, Chaloner clutched a 33 00:02:53,080 --> 00:02:56,079 Speaker 1: sheaf of papers fodder for a pamphlet, declaring that he 34 00:02:56,160 --> 00:02:58,880 Speaker 1: was the victim of a frame up. He yelled to 35 00:02:58,919 --> 00:03:02,280 Speaker 1: anyone who would listen to he was innocent. I am innocent, 36 00:03:02,800 --> 00:03:06,320 Speaker 1: That he was murdered by perjury and in justice and 37 00:03:06,520 --> 00:03:12,960 Speaker 1: pretense of law, and by the warden of the mint himself. 38 00:03:15,520 --> 00:03:19,320 Speaker 1: It didn't matter. In his last moments, Challenger went quiet. 39 00:03:19,840 --> 00:03:22,840 Speaker 1: He mounted the ladder. The cap was placed over his 40 00:03:22,919 --> 00:03:25,600 Speaker 1: weeping eyes, and the noose over his head and around 41 00:03:25,680 --> 00:03:30,200 Speaker 1: his neck, and as hundreds of people watched, Challenger dangled 42 00:03:30,200 --> 00:03:32,960 Speaker 1: and kicked until the blood vessels in his face popped, 43 00:03:34,320 --> 00:03:41,880 Speaker 1: until the breath was choked from his lungs. Gravity did 44 00:03:41,920 --> 00:03:50,320 Speaker 1: its thing. After his body was pulled down from the scaffold, 45 00:03:50,520 --> 00:03:54,040 Speaker 1: he was publicly disemboweled. His head might have ended up 46 00:03:54,040 --> 00:03:56,840 Speaker 1: on a spike on the London Bridge. We're not entirely sure, 47 00:03:57,160 --> 00:04:00,360 Speaker 1: but that's what happened to the people who were excuted 48 00:04:00,400 --> 00:04:03,920 Speaker 1: for counterfeiting. And it was all because of one man, 49 00:04:04,520 --> 00:04:11,000 Speaker 1: the doggedly determined, completely ruthless, utterly meticulous Warden of the 50 00:04:11,120 --> 00:04:16,760 Speaker 1: Royal Mint. The Warden of the Royal Mint was the 51 00:04:16,800 --> 00:04:20,760 Speaker 1: man charged with making the country's coin, the actual physical 52 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:24,839 Speaker 1: silver and gold that fueled England's engine of commerce. The 53 00:04:24,880 --> 00:04:27,520 Speaker 1: warden was also charged with protecting it, with keeping it 54 00:04:27,600 --> 00:04:33,159 Speaker 1: safe from counterfeiters and clippers. And this warden was very 55 00:04:33,200 --> 00:04:36,559 Speaker 1: good at his job, putting dozens of people in jail, 56 00:04:36,720 --> 00:04:40,919 Speaker 1: shutting down coining operations left and right, and as in 57 00:04:40,960 --> 00:04:44,560 Speaker 1: the case of Mr Challoner, sending counterfeiters to the gallows 58 00:04:44,680 --> 00:04:49,800 Speaker 1: without a second thought. So who was this ruthless detective, 59 00:04:50,400 --> 00:04:54,039 Speaker 1: this hard bitten crook catcher, totally unmoved by the pleas 60 00:04:54,080 --> 00:05:01,760 Speaker 1: of a desperate man. It was Isaac Newton. Us that 61 00:05:02,360 --> 00:05:08,839 Speaker 1: Isaac Newton for I Heart Radio. I'm Linda Rodriguez mccrabbie, 62 00:05:09,320 --> 00:05:13,800 Speaker 1: and this is Newton's Law and I heart original podcast 63 00:05:20,520 --> 00:05:56,080 Speaker 1: you much so, Episode one, The Warden and the con 64 00:05:56,200 --> 00:06:09,480 Speaker 1: Man Cool. I'm standing outside the courtyard of the British Library, 65 00:06:09,600 --> 00:06:13,840 Speaker 1: just off of Houston Road. Normally this courtyard is full 66 00:06:13,839 --> 00:06:16,000 Speaker 1: of people. There's a coffee shop in there, and there's 67 00:06:16,040 --> 00:06:19,320 Speaker 1: loads of people usually out sitting on the benches enjoying 68 00:06:19,360 --> 00:06:22,760 Speaker 1: some sun on a coffee break in between researching. Now, 69 00:06:22,880 --> 00:06:25,960 Speaker 1: right now, because of coronavirus, it's only open to free 70 00:06:25,960 --> 00:06:29,680 Speaker 1: book visitors. But just over the wall, I can see 71 00:06:30,080 --> 00:06:35,320 Speaker 1: the giant statue of Isaac Newton. Now, this statue, I 72 00:06:35,400 --> 00:06:38,680 Speaker 1: must have passed it hundreds of times going to the 73 00:06:38,720 --> 00:06:43,520 Speaker 1: library to do research, and I've never really thought about it, 74 00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:48,240 Speaker 1: never really noticed it. The statue depicts Newton bent over 75 00:06:48,279 --> 00:06:52,240 Speaker 1: in a really rather uncomfortable looking position, and he's got 76 00:06:52,240 --> 00:06:56,359 Speaker 1: a compass and he's determining the geometry of the universe. 77 00:06:57,080 --> 00:07:02,600 Speaker 1: It's a testament to Newton's scientific yes, but it absolutely 78 00:07:02,720 --> 00:07:06,440 Speaker 1: leaves out the other half of his life, the half 79 00:07:06,440 --> 00:07:12,680 Speaker 1: of the life that most people don't really know about. 80 00:07:11,560 --> 00:07:17,520 Speaker 1: What do you know about Isaac discovered gravity? He was 81 00:07:18,040 --> 00:07:21,720 Speaker 1: good in physics, and he invented like the three principles 82 00:07:21,720 --> 00:07:27,800 Speaker 1: of gravity. That's much signs, to be honest with me, 83 00:07:28,200 --> 00:07:32,680 Speaker 1: very smart guy, smart than me, obviously. Do you know 84 00:07:32,760 --> 00:07:36,240 Speaker 1: anything else about the rest of his life? I have 85 00:07:36,320 --> 00:07:40,760 Speaker 1: no idea about him as personality. Did you know anything 86 00:07:40,800 --> 00:07:46,960 Speaker 1: about me? In his life? After he discovered gravity? Got rich? 87 00:07:50,960 --> 00:07:56,320 Speaker 1: Got rich? Well, he was making money, lots of it 88 00:07:56,600 --> 00:08:00,360 Speaker 1: literally as warden of the Royal Mint, and he did 89 00:08:00,440 --> 00:08:04,080 Speaker 1: get a big salary increase too. But this story is 90 00:08:04,120 --> 00:08:08,960 Speaker 1: about more than just Isaac Newton's lucrative second career. Everything 91 00:08:09,000 --> 00:08:12,040 Speaker 1: that Newton touched, everything that he was involved in, became 92 00:08:12,160 --> 00:08:15,120 Speaker 1: part of the fabric of our modern world, and not 93 00:08:15,240 --> 00:08:18,000 Speaker 1: just because we use his calculations every day to keep 94 00:08:18,040 --> 00:08:22,160 Speaker 1: satellites in orbit and our smartphones running. His story unfolds 95 00:08:22,160 --> 00:08:24,880 Speaker 1: at a time when the structures that we inhabit now 96 00:08:25,360 --> 00:08:29,240 Speaker 1: are just being built. We're talking about, and we will 97 00:08:29,320 --> 00:08:33,120 Speaker 1: be talking about in this podcast, what actually is money. 98 00:08:33,640 --> 00:08:35,839 Speaker 1: We're talking about the origins of print media and its 99 00:08:35,880 --> 00:08:39,320 Speaker 1: power to change political discourse and policy, and about the 100 00:08:39,320 --> 00:08:41,800 Speaker 1: meaning of criminal justice in a time when there are 101 00:08:41,920 --> 00:08:46,920 Speaker 1: courts but no police. But it's still a weird story. 102 00:08:47,120 --> 00:08:50,880 Speaker 1: Newton made this big career change after his most consequential 103 00:08:50,920 --> 00:08:54,720 Speaker 1: intellectual achievement, but arguably at a time when he still 104 00:08:54,760 --> 00:08:58,800 Speaker 1: had more to give. So I started with this question, 105 00:09:00,040 --> 00:09:04,559 Speaker 1: why would Isaac Newton leave the cozy confines of academia 106 00:09:04,679 --> 00:09:10,040 Speaker 1: and a career of remarkable success to go chase criminals? 107 00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:28,120 Speaker 1: Act one an object at rest, I keep the subject 108 00:09:28,240 --> 00:09:32,800 Speaker 1: constantly before me untill the first dawnings open, slowly, little 109 00:09:32,840 --> 00:09:38,360 Speaker 1: by little, into the full and clear light. Newton had 110 00:09:38,360 --> 00:09:41,000 Speaker 1: been in academic since sixteen sixty one, when he first 111 00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:44,400 Speaker 1: came to Trinity College at Cambridge University. At the time, 112 00:09:44,679 --> 00:09:48,000 Speaker 1: he was an intellectually adventurous nineteen year old fresh of 113 00:09:48,040 --> 00:09:52,720 Speaker 1: a Lincolnshire farm. Cambridge University academically did not have a 114 00:09:52,760 --> 00:09:57,800 Speaker 1: good reputation during the seventeenth and eighteen centuries. That's Dr 115 00:09:57,840 --> 00:10:02,000 Speaker 1: Patricia Farre, Cambridge historian and author of Life After Gravity. 116 00:10:02,200 --> 00:10:05,760 Speaker 1: So foreign visitors came and they looked at Oxford and Cambridge, 117 00:10:05,800 --> 00:10:08,800 Speaker 1: and they said it's just ridiculous, all the all the 118 00:10:08,840 --> 00:10:11,720 Speaker 1: books and drawing moldy and the libraries. A lot of 119 00:10:11,760 --> 00:10:15,360 Speaker 1: the professors scarcely gave any lectures of quite a few 120 00:10:15,440 --> 00:10:19,800 Speaker 1: of them lived down in London. There weren't any female students, 121 00:10:19,800 --> 00:10:22,560 Speaker 1: so the whole community was male. It was a very 122 00:10:22,600 --> 00:10:29,200 Speaker 1: sort of close community. Cambridge's limitations didn't bother Newton at first. 123 00:10:29,679 --> 00:10:33,160 Speaker 1: Newton was already brilliant. He'd taught himself higher order mathematics 124 00:10:33,200 --> 00:10:37,400 Speaker 1: in six months. By sixteen sixty five, he'd already formulated 125 00:10:37,440 --> 00:10:40,760 Speaker 1: his famous theory of gravity, although it would be years 126 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:44,760 Speaker 1: before he published it, and he wasn't bothered by the 127 00:10:44,840 --> 00:10:48,400 Speaker 1: lack of social activities. If anything, he probably preferred avoiding 128 00:10:48,440 --> 00:10:53,240 Speaker 1: women and drinking and other people. Honestly, Nowton was a 129 00:10:53,280 --> 00:10:56,160 Speaker 1: bit of a prig. Here's what he wrote to a 130 00:10:56,200 --> 00:10:59,800 Speaker 1: fellow student in sixteen sixty one. It is commonly rep 131 00:11:00,000 --> 00:11:04,280 Speaker 1: WoT is that you are sick. Truly, I am sorry 132 00:11:04,320 --> 00:11:07,560 Speaker 1: for that, but I am much more sorry that you 133 00:11:07,640 --> 00:11:13,040 Speaker 1: got your sickness by drinking too much. I earnestly desire 134 00:11:13,040 --> 00:11:16,000 Speaker 1: you to first repent of your having been drunk and 135 00:11:16,120 --> 00:11:21,520 Speaker 1: then to seek to recover your health. Fun guy. What 136 00:11:21,720 --> 00:11:24,880 Speaker 1: Camerid really gave Newton was time to do the one 137 00:11:24,960 --> 00:11:29,400 Speaker 1: thing he wanted to do. Study to caught a glass. 138 00:11:29,679 --> 00:11:34,000 Speaker 1: Take a plain glass, hold it upside downward over a candle. 139 00:11:34,200 --> 00:11:40,600 Speaker 1: Newton had questions, hundreds thousands of questions about everything. Take 140 00:11:40,720 --> 00:11:44,199 Speaker 1: such meat as they love as wet, and he explored 141 00:11:44,240 --> 00:11:52,280 Speaker 1: those questions of notebooks and sprinkle it were birds in 142 00:11:52,360 --> 00:11:55,480 Speaker 1: the manner of the extraction of roots acted powers is 143 00:11:55,559 --> 00:11:59,040 Speaker 1: very much alike, especially when the attempts that let me 144 00:11:59,160 --> 00:12:02,960 Speaker 1: no ambiguity all fractions. Newton was also fearless when it 145 00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:06,000 Speaker 1: came to experimentation. This is a man who stuck a 146 00:12:06,040 --> 00:12:10,240 Speaker 1: bodkin basically a large needle into his own eye to 147 00:12:10,320 --> 00:12:13,800 Speaker 1: observe changes in his perception of color. He also spent 148 00:12:13,840 --> 00:12:17,360 Speaker 1: a bit of time literally staring at the sun. I 149 00:12:17,400 --> 00:12:20,440 Speaker 1: saw only the sun before me, so that I could 150 00:12:20,520 --> 00:12:23,800 Speaker 1: neither write nor read, but to recover the use of 151 00:12:23,840 --> 00:12:27,080 Speaker 1: my eyes, shut myself up in my chamber, made dark 152 00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:30,640 Speaker 1: for three days together, and used all means to direct 153 00:12:30,679 --> 00:12:34,439 Speaker 1: my imagination from the sun. Ironically, one of his notebook 154 00:12:34,520 --> 00:12:39,400 Speaker 1: entries concerns things hurtful for the eyes, garlic onions, leaks, 155 00:12:40,000 --> 00:12:44,280 Speaker 1: all the much lettuce, going to sudden aftermat lot wise, 156 00:12:45,080 --> 00:12:51,200 Speaker 1: cold air, much sleep after meat fire, much weeping, and 157 00:12:52,160 --> 00:12:56,760 Speaker 1: watching Newton's assistant during his later Cambridge years, knew him 158 00:12:56,840 --> 00:13:00,240 Speaker 1: as a near recluse, as the original model of the 159 00:13:00,280 --> 00:13:04,360 Speaker 1: absent minded but super focused professor. I never knew him 160 00:13:04,400 --> 00:13:07,880 Speaker 1: take any recreational pastime, either in riding out to take 161 00:13:07,920 --> 00:13:12,480 Speaker 1: the air, walking, bowling, or any other exercise whatever, thinking 162 00:13:12,559 --> 00:13:15,200 Speaker 1: all hours lost that were not spent, any studies to 163 00:13:15,280 --> 00:13:17,960 Speaker 1: which he kept so close that he seldom left his chamber. 164 00:13:20,720 --> 00:13:24,200 Speaker 1: Newton's intellect set him apart. It made it difficult for 165 00:13:24,280 --> 00:13:27,640 Speaker 1: him to connect with his peers or anyone else, but 166 00:13:27,679 --> 00:13:32,080 Speaker 1: if he was lonely, he didn't let on. At the 167 00:13:32,120 --> 00:13:36,199 Speaker 1: age of seven, he'd taken over the Lucaezian Professorship of Mathematics. 168 00:13:36,880 --> 00:13:40,480 Speaker 1: These days this is one of the most prestigious professorships 169 00:13:40,520 --> 00:13:44,920 Speaker 1: in the world, Like Stephen Hawking, Charles Babbage, and well 170 00:13:45,400 --> 00:13:48,880 Speaker 1: Isaac Newton prostigious. He was only the second person to 171 00:13:48,960 --> 00:13:51,920 Speaker 1: hold the positions, so it didn't yet have the reputation 172 00:13:51,960 --> 00:13:55,480 Speaker 1: that it has now, but still it was a pretty 173 00:13:55,480 --> 00:13:59,040 Speaker 1: good gig, not least because it gave him room board 174 00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:02,000 Speaker 1: and a hundred twenty pounds a year in exchange for 175 00:14:02,040 --> 00:14:05,960 Speaker 1: teaching one course of lectures every three terms, regardless of 176 00:14:06,000 --> 00:14:08,960 Speaker 1: whether anyone showed up to hear them. By all reports, 177 00:14:09,000 --> 00:14:13,080 Speaker 1: he was an absolutely appalling lecturer. There's a joke that 178 00:14:13,160 --> 00:14:16,840 Speaker 1: two undergraduates saw him in the street and they nudged 179 00:14:16,880 --> 00:14:19,520 Speaker 1: each other, and one of them said, there goes the 180 00:14:19,560 --> 00:14:22,520 Speaker 1: man who lectures to the walls. And what they meant 181 00:14:22,520 --> 00:14:25,120 Speaker 1: by that was that that he had to keep a lecture. 182 00:14:25,120 --> 00:14:28,600 Speaker 1: It was compulsory, but no students bothered to attend, and 183 00:14:28,640 --> 00:14:34,680 Speaker 1: so he just spoke to the empty room when he 184 00:14:34,760 --> 00:14:39,600 Speaker 1: wasn't lecturing too empty rooms. Newton, among other things, designed 185 00:14:39,680 --> 00:14:44,400 Speaker 1: and crafted his own telescope. This was a major accomplishment 186 00:14:44,440 --> 00:14:47,000 Speaker 1: at a time when instruments like that were at the 187 00:14:47,200 --> 00:14:51,320 Speaker 1: very bleeding edge of new technology. They were complicated to 188 00:14:51,360 --> 00:14:56,360 Speaker 1: make and very valuable, but Newton was impatient. If I'd 189 00:14:56,360 --> 00:14:59,000 Speaker 1: have waited for other people to make my tools and things, 190 00:14:59,160 --> 00:15:02,160 Speaker 1: I should never have made anything of it. It was 191 00:15:02,200 --> 00:15:05,880 Speaker 1: this telescope that, in six seventy two got Newton into 192 00:15:05,920 --> 00:15:10,040 Speaker 1: the Royal Society, the foremost club of natural philosophers, and 193 00:15:10,120 --> 00:15:13,360 Speaker 1: scientists in the country. This was a big deal. Newton 194 00:15:13,400 --> 00:15:17,320 Speaker 1: was now an acknowledged genius, at least among people who 195 00:15:17,400 --> 00:15:20,520 Speaker 1: knew what that looked like. If I have seen further, 196 00:15:20,920 --> 00:15:25,480 Speaker 1: it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. Now 197 00:15:26,000 --> 00:15:29,520 Speaker 1: Newton might not have been this humble really. I mean, 198 00:15:29,760 --> 00:15:32,720 Speaker 1: he did think he was smarter than everyone else, because 199 00:15:32,880 --> 00:15:37,000 Speaker 1: he was. But he was also frequently plagued by self doubt, 200 00:15:37,160 --> 00:15:40,120 Speaker 1: which was one of the reasons he hated publishing his work. 201 00:15:40,880 --> 00:15:47,680 Speaker 1: Newton was, like most other actual human beings, complicated. Newton's 202 00:15:47,720 --> 00:15:51,080 Speaker 1: appointment to the Royal Society began wrenching him out of 203 00:15:51,120 --> 00:15:57,320 Speaker 1: the isolation of Cambridge, corresponding with other scholars and scientists, 204 00:15:57,560 --> 00:16:00,680 Speaker 1: many in London, people who understood what he was talking about, 205 00:16:00,720 --> 00:16:05,240 Speaker 1: at least most of the time, planted a seed. I 206 00:16:05,360 --> 00:16:08,080 Speaker 1: do not only esteem it a duty to concur with 207 00:16:08,160 --> 00:16:12,080 Speaker 1: them in the promotion of real knowledge, but a great privilege. 208 00:16:13,040 --> 00:16:17,680 Speaker 1: Instead of exposing discourses to a prejudiced and censorious multitude, 209 00:16:18,040 --> 00:16:21,160 Speaker 1: by which means many truths have been baffled and lost, 210 00:16:21,880 --> 00:16:26,160 Speaker 1: I may, with freedom apply myself to so judicious and 211 00:16:26,280 --> 00:16:36,080 Speaker 1: impartial an assembly meaning people get him. Finally, if becoming 212 00:16:36,080 --> 00:16:39,440 Speaker 1: a fellow made him a genius. Then his magnum opus, 213 00:16:39,560 --> 00:16:44,440 Speaker 1: Principium Mathematica made him a rock star. Why should that 214 00:16:44,520 --> 00:16:48,720 Speaker 1: apple always descend perpendicularly to the ground? Why should not 215 00:16:48,760 --> 00:16:51,920 Speaker 1: go sideways or upwards, but constantly to the earth center. 216 00:16:52,680 --> 00:16:56,360 Speaker 1: Principia was published in six when Newton was forty four. 217 00:16:56,840 --> 00:16:59,720 Speaker 1: It described his laws of motion and theory of gravity, 218 00:17:00,120 --> 00:17:02,560 Speaker 1: and was as close as anyone had gotten at this 219 00:17:02,640 --> 00:17:07,280 Speaker 1: point to glimpsing the inner workings of the universe. Assuredly, 220 00:17:07,640 --> 00:17:12,240 Speaker 1: the reason is that the Earth draws it. There must 221 00:17:12,320 --> 00:17:16,399 Speaker 1: be a drawing power in matter, and the sum of 222 00:17:16,520 --> 00:17:19,480 Speaker 1: the drawing power in the matter of the Earth must 223 00:17:19,560 --> 00:17:24,720 Speaker 1: be in the Earth center. After the book was published, 224 00:17:25,240 --> 00:17:30,600 Speaker 1: he became well known amongst the Marrow group of elite mathematicians, 225 00:17:30,600 --> 00:17:33,879 Speaker 1: who became known all over Europe for the brilliance of 226 00:17:33,960 --> 00:17:40,320 Speaker 1: his work, but only amongst people who were mathematically powerful 227 00:17:40,440 --> 00:17:44,879 Speaker 1: enough to understand the import of what he's written. The 228 00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:49,879 Speaker 1: publication of Principias thrust Newton into the intellectual limelight, but 229 00:17:50,359 --> 00:17:55,040 Speaker 1: back in Cambridge he was still barely understood. Newton once 230 00:17:55,040 --> 00:17:58,680 Speaker 1: wrote to his knees, I overheard a student say there 231 00:17:58,720 --> 00:18:01,159 Speaker 1: goes the man that has writ a book that neither 232 00:18:01,240 --> 00:18:06,879 Speaker 1: he nor anybody else understands. They were talking about me. Me. 233 00:18:07,840 --> 00:18:12,560 Speaker 1: Then in Newton was elected Cambridge's Member of Parliament, so 234 00:18:12,600 --> 00:18:14,520 Speaker 1: he lived in London for the better part of a year. 235 00:18:15,080 --> 00:18:19,840 Speaker 1: How this happened and why, well, that's another story. But 236 00:18:19,920 --> 00:18:22,720 Speaker 1: when he returned to the university it was even more 237 00:18:22,760 --> 00:18:27,520 Speaker 1: apparent there was nothing in Cambridge for him, not intellectually, 238 00:18:27,840 --> 00:18:32,600 Speaker 1: not socially. Nothing. So by the early sixteen nineties, after 239 00:18:32,720 --> 00:18:39,640 Speaker 1: thirty five years, Newton wanted out of Cambridge. I fear 240 00:18:39,760 --> 00:18:43,439 Speaker 1: no one understands me. Here the books grow malty in 241 00:18:43,440 --> 00:18:50,800 Speaker 1: their libraries. It is too small, too mean. But London, London, 242 00:18:51,560 --> 00:18:55,439 Speaker 1: that's where everything was happening, and that's where Newton wanted 243 00:18:55,480 --> 00:18:59,359 Speaker 1: to be. So Newton started looking around for a new job, 244 00:19:00,080 --> 00:19:02,359 Speaker 1: or rather he got some of his powerful friends to 245 00:19:02,440 --> 00:19:05,639 Speaker 1: look for him. Frankly, nobody's getting high paying jobs in 246 00:19:05,640 --> 00:19:09,800 Speaker 1: the seventeenth century because they were qualified for them. Newton's 247 00:19:09,840 --> 00:19:12,680 Speaker 1: first love of motion states that an object will stay 248 00:19:12,680 --> 00:19:16,439 Speaker 1: at rest unless acted upon by an external force. And 249 00:19:16,520 --> 00:19:19,679 Speaker 1: it was only when the Earl of Halifax wrote to 250 00:19:19,800 --> 00:19:23,600 Speaker 1: him and said, I found you this wonderful job as 251 00:19:23,800 --> 00:19:27,800 Speaker 1: warden of the Mint. It pays five hundred pounds a year. 252 00:19:28,600 --> 00:19:32,679 Speaker 1: This new job came with a much better salary, and 253 00:19:33,080 --> 00:19:36,480 Speaker 1: the Earl of Halifax promised the mint practically ran itself. 254 00:19:37,320 --> 00:19:41,240 Speaker 1: And you went down to London the next day and said, yes, 255 00:19:41,359 --> 00:19:43,520 Speaker 1: I would love to be warden with the Mint. He 256 00:19:43,600 --> 00:19:46,399 Speaker 1: went back to Cambridge, packed up all his bags. A 257 00:19:46,400 --> 00:19:48,760 Speaker 1: few weeks later he was stamped in London and hardly 258 00:19:48,760 --> 00:19:56,439 Speaker 1: went back to Cambridge again. On May second, Newton left Cambridge. 259 00:19:59,320 --> 00:20:04,240 Speaker 1: He never looked back. Really. Reams of letters between him 260 00:20:04,280 --> 00:20:07,159 Speaker 1: and his friends and family and professional contacts still exist, 261 00:20:07,520 --> 00:20:11,160 Speaker 1: but there are exactly zero from him to anyone at 262 00:20:11,200 --> 00:20:16,919 Speaker 1: Cambridge after he left for London. It would have taken 263 00:20:16,960 --> 00:20:20,639 Speaker 1: Isaac Newton two days maybe three to reach London by 264 00:20:20,680 --> 00:20:23,800 Speaker 1: horse or stagecoach. It had been a wet winter followed 265 00:20:23,800 --> 00:20:25,840 Speaker 1: by a wet spring, and the roads would have been 266 00:20:25,880 --> 00:20:29,280 Speaker 1: plugged with mud. As he inched towards the city, he 267 00:20:29,400 --> 00:20:32,600 Speaker 1: may have imagined his new life there. He could work 268 00:20:32,640 --> 00:20:35,520 Speaker 1: a few days a week if that, devote the rest 269 00:20:35,560 --> 00:20:38,560 Speaker 1: of his time to research, to spending time in coffee 270 00:20:38,560 --> 00:20:41,960 Speaker 1: shops and in conversation with other brilliant people to being 271 00:20:42,080 --> 00:20:46,680 Speaker 1: a universally acknowledged genius in the greatest city in the world. 272 00:20:48,640 --> 00:20:53,160 Speaker 1: When he arrived, he'd no longer be a dusty Cambridge scholar. 273 00:20:54,080 --> 00:20:58,080 Speaker 1: He'd emerged into the filthy, crowded air of the city, 274 00:20:58,440 --> 00:21:18,040 Speaker 1: a new van, a london Man. M Act two the 275 00:21:18,200 --> 00:21:24,879 Speaker 1: center of gravity. The road Newton was traveling would have 276 00:21:24,920 --> 00:21:28,439 Speaker 1: become more crowded and busier the closer he got to London. 277 00:21:28,720 --> 00:21:30,879 Speaker 1: From the top of one of the hills outside the city, 278 00:21:31,240 --> 00:21:32,840 Speaker 1: if it had been a clear day, he might have 279 00:21:32,880 --> 00:21:36,080 Speaker 1: been able to see the Tower of London, the home 280 00:21:36,280 --> 00:21:44,000 Speaker 1: of the Royal Mint. London was only sixty five miles 281 00:21:44,000 --> 00:21:46,840 Speaker 1: away from Cambridge, but it might as well have been 282 00:21:46,960 --> 00:21:51,320 Speaker 1: in a completely different universe. London had started as a 283 00:21:51,440 --> 00:21:53,520 Speaker 1: Roman settlement on the banks of the Thames in the 284 00:21:53,560 --> 00:21:58,320 Speaker 1: first century, a roughly square mile planted behind defensive walls, 285 00:21:58,520 --> 00:22:01,399 Speaker 1: the remains of which still gave its shape. By the 286 00:22:01,400 --> 00:22:04,760 Speaker 1: time Newton arrived, however, it was already swallowing up the 287 00:22:04,800 --> 00:22:08,119 Speaker 1: farms and villages outside the original walls. The fields were 288 00:22:08,240 --> 00:22:12,320 Speaker 1: quickly being replaced by homes and streets and markets. Newton 289 00:22:12,359 --> 00:22:15,159 Speaker 1: would have entered the old Roman city what's called the 290 00:22:15,200 --> 00:22:17,600 Speaker 1: City of London with a capital C through one of 291 00:22:17,640 --> 00:22:20,040 Speaker 1: the northern gates, and then he would have made his 292 00:22:20,119 --> 00:22:25,439 Speaker 1: way through the winding streets to the tower. Now, the 293 00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:28,240 Speaker 1: Tower of London is not a single tower. It's actually 294 00:22:28,280 --> 00:22:30,879 Speaker 1: a fortified complex of stone buildings that were built on 295 00:22:30,920 --> 00:22:33,399 Speaker 1: the banks of the Thames in the eleventh century. The 296 00:22:33,520 --> 00:22:36,240 Speaker 1: Royal Mint had been located at the tower since twelve 297 00:22:36,320 --> 00:22:39,680 Speaker 1: seventy nine, Sandwiched between the inner and outer curtain walls 298 00:22:39,720 --> 00:22:42,600 Speaker 1: on the west side of the complex. The tower was 299 00:22:42,680 --> 00:22:45,840 Speaker 1: a busy place. It was home to a garrison, an armory, 300 00:22:46,200 --> 00:22:49,159 Speaker 1: and of course a prison for important criminals. There was 301 00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:53,719 Speaker 1: even a zoo there with lions and pomas. The Mint's 302 00:22:53,760 --> 00:22:56,840 Speaker 1: location at the tower meant that it could be heavily guarded. 303 00:22:57,359 --> 00:23:00,240 Speaker 1: No one could enter or leave without being up and 304 00:23:00,320 --> 00:23:03,560 Speaker 1: checked by armed guards. This was the image of the 305 00:23:03,560 --> 00:23:06,720 Speaker 1: Mint that the government wanted to broadcast, that it was 306 00:23:06,800 --> 00:23:10,560 Speaker 1: safe in the most impenetrable fortress in the country, under 307 00:23:10,600 --> 00:23:15,600 Speaker 1: guard and now run by the smartest man in the world. 308 00:23:20,760 --> 00:23:23,960 Speaker 1: Newton unpacked his bags and his new home inside the Mint. 309 00:23:24,480 --> 00:23:26,800 Speaker 1: The job came with lodgings, at least until they could 310 00:23:26,800 --> 00:23:32,399 Speaker 1: find somewhere nicer, less smelly, less noisy. But if Newton 311 00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:34,680 Speaker 1: stood on the tower walls, he could have seen the 312 00:23:34,760 --> 00:23:38,480 Speaker 1: murky River Thames lapping at the stone below him. Across 313 00:23:38,480 --> 00:23:40,720 Speaker 1: the river to the south, he would have seen Suffolk, 314 00:23:40,840 --> 00:23:45,040 Speaker 1: the pleasure district known for playhouses and prostitutes, and he 315 00:23:45,119 --> 00:23:48,320 Speaker 1: would very likely not have been a frequent visitor south 316 00:23:48,359 --> 00:23:51,960 Speaker 1: of the river. But take the river west further inland 317 00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:54,600 Speaker 1: and he would have been in Marshy Westminster, home to 318 00:23:54,680 --> 00:24:00,600 Speaker 1: Parliament and the seat of the country's political power. Go 319 00:24:00,800 --> 00:24:03,760 Speaker 1: east and he'd have been in the warehouses and docks. 320 00:24:03,760 --> 00:24:07,359 Speaker 1: The place is built to accommodate the country's increasingly global trade. 321 00:24:09,160 --> 00:24:17,000 Speaker 1: And just outside his walls London, big, bustling, messy, beautiful London, 322 00:24:17,520 --> 00:24:21,920 Speaker 1: a city where shacks hovels shared walls with palaces and mansions, 323 00:24:22,119 --> 00:24:24,960 Speaker 1: where the desperately poor walked the same streets that the 324 00:24:25,000 --> 00:24:29,040 Speaker 1: wealthy were carried on sedan chairs through. It was already 325 00:24:29,119 --> 00:24:31,399 Speaker 1: one of the largest cities in the world, home to 326 00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:34,920 Speaker 1: more than six hundred thousand people, and it was still growing. 327 00:24:38,600 --> 00:24:41,439 Speaker 1: Just too close and loud in here, I can't think 328 00:24:42,520 --> 00:24:55,960 Speaker 1: I must walk. If Newton left the tower and took 329 00:24:55,960 --> 00:24:59,760 Speaker 1: a walk he'd see a city in the throes of modernization. 330 00:25:00,280 --> 00:25:02,960 Speaker 1: London had been dealt too serious blows in the sixteen 331 00:25:03,000 --> 00:25:06,119 Speaker 1: sixties when Isaac Newton was still finding his feet in Cambridge. 332 00:25:06,520 --> 00:25:10,399 Speaker 1: First several bouts of the plague killed fifteen of the 333 00:25:10,400 --> 00:25:13,800 Speaker 1: City of London's population, and then the Great Fire in 334 00:25:13,840 --> 00:25:18,080 Speaker 1: sixteen sixty six burnt down eight percent of the city, 335 00:25:18,240 --> 00:25:22,680 Speaker 1: Medieval London within the walls. But London wasn't down for long. 336 00:25:23,040 --> 00:25:28,240 Speaker 1: In the years since it had rebuilt, was rebuilding. Just 337 00:25:28,480 --> 00:25:31,720 Speaker 1: up the street from Newton's new digs, London's print media 338 00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:35,560 Speaker 1: industry was taking root on Fleet Street. This area was 339 00:25:35,680 --> 00:25:38,879 Speaker 1: buoyed by rising demand for published words and pamphlets and 340 00:25:38,920 --> 00:25:43,840 Speaker 1: newspapers and broadsides, by cheaper printing technologies and increasing freedom 341 00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,240 Speaker 1: in what could be printed. The latest broadsides and plantets 342 00:25:48,520 --> 00:25:57,720 Speaker 1: redebouting here cheaper than stories. The Sussex Jacket the most 343 00:25:57,920 --> 00:26:03,480 Speaker 1: terrible see se b have but including, as we'll see, 344 00:26:03,880 --> 00:26:07,159 Speaker 1: attacks on the mint. I new proposal to address the 345 00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:10,400 Speaker 1: deplorable state of the coiner. None of you will fight 346 00:26:10,520 --> 00:26:14,399 Speaker 1: coolins good stays. But while Newton is getting to know 347 00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:17,960 Speaker 1: the streets of his new home, you really ought to 348 00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:21,840 Speaker 1: keep an eye on his purse. Because, of course the 349 00:26:21,920 --> 00:26:26,359 Speaker 1: old industries were still there. Among them, crime and all 350 00:26:26,560 --> 00:26:30,760 Speaker 1: its myriad forms. Crime had always existed in London, of course, 351 00:26:30,760 --> 00:26:33,760 Speaker 1: but as the city grew, crime rates did too. This 352 00:26:33,880 --> 00:26:37,919 Speaker 1: makes sense, right, more people, more opportunity, more crime. London 353 00:26:38,000 --> 00:26:40,960 Speaker 1: was also a city with incredible rates of poverty, which 354 00:26:41,119 --> 00:26:44,359 Speaker 1: made criminals out of people who probably wouldn't have been otherwise. 355 00:26:46,160 --> 00:26:50,560 Speaker 1: But and here's the thing. While there are courts and 356 00:26:50,840 --> 00:26:55,080 Speaker 1: severe punishments if you're caught, there's no agency trying to 357 00:26:55,200 --> 00:26:59,600 Speaker 1: stop people from committing crimes or actively trying to catch them. 358 00:26:59,640 --> 00:27:03,200 Speaker 1: So it's kind of a good time to be a criminal, 359 00:27:04,400 --> 00:27:09,199 Speaker 1: especially an entrepreneurial one, like our friend, the near murdered 360 00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:20,280 Speaker 1: humble servant William Chaloner. When Newton left Cambridge, craving intellectual 361 00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:24,760 Speaker 1: understanding and fellowship or literally anything that wasn't Cambridge, he 362 00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,359 Speaker 1: had no idea that the London he was moving to 363 00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:32,399 Speaker 1: was Chaloner's world, a world of cutthroats and quacks, of 364 00:27:32,600 --> 00:27:38,639 Speaker 1: Charlatan's and conmen and of course counterfeiters. London is the 365 00:27:38,640 --> 00:27:41,719 Speaker 1: city of opportunity, and it's not just an opportunity for 366 00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:48,600 Speaker 1: properly Cambridge or Oxford trained, professionally clever people. London was 367 00:27:48,640 --> 00:27:54,520 Speaker 1: this magnet for the entire countryside. That's Tom Levinson, science 368 00:27:54,600 --> 00:27:57,960 Speaker 1: historian and author of Newton and the Counterfeiter, the unknown 369 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:02,720 Speaker 1: detective career of the world's grayist scientist. Kids who are 370 00:28:02,880 --> 00:28:06,960 Speaker 1: men and women who wanted to escape whatever whatever circumstances 371 00:28:06,960 --> 00:28:10,480 Speaker 1: they were in in the agricultural world that was most 372 00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:13,160 Speaker 1: of England would come to London and they would try 373 00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:17,240 Speaker 1: and find work. There were more opportunities, though many of 374 00:28:17,280 --> 00:28:21,320 Speaker 1: them were perhaps not viewed on with joy by the 375 00:28:21,880 --> 00:28:25,360 Speaker 1: actual authorities. You look at a man like William Challoner, 376 00:28:25,720 --> 00:28:28,359 Speaker 1: who would come to play quite a rolandizing. It was 377 00:28:28,440 --> 00:28:33,879 Speaker 1: like he came to London and started hustling. William Chaloner, 378 00:28:34,320 --> 00:28:38,080 Speaker 1: like Newton, was not a London native. He was from Warwickshire. 379 00:28:38,160 --> 00:28:41,760 Speaker 1: His family was working class poor. His father was a weaver. 380 00:28:42,400 --> 00:28:44,880 Speaker 1: Now we know some of what we know about William 381 00:28:44,960 --> 00:28:48,920 Speaker 1: Challoner thanks to this anonymous biography, The Short View of 382 00:28:48,920 --> 00:28:53,080 Speaker 1: the Life of William Challon, written about him shortly after 383 00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:57,400 Speaker 1: his execution. These kinds of biographies of notable criminals were 384 00:28:57,440 --> 00:28:59,920 Speaker 1: fairly common at the time. Just as they are now. 385 00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,280 Speaker 1: But this one does a really lovely job of being 386 00:29:03,360 --> 00:29:09,480 Speaker 1: simultaneously appalled and impressed by Chaloner. According to the biography, 387 00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:12,680 Speaker 1: although Chaloner was evidently a bright kid, he channeled that 388 00:29:12,760 --> 00:29:16,560 Speaker 1: intelligence and to quote some unlucky rogue streak or other, 389 00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:20,280 Speaker 1: from early on. His father couldn't take it anymore, so 390 00:29:20,320 --> 00:29:22,880 Speaker 1: he sent young William to learn a trade in Birmingham, 391 00:29:23,320 --> 00:29:25,920 Speaker 1: then a fast growing market town about a hundred miles 392 00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:31,120 Speaker 1: from London. Chaloner was apprenticed to a nail maker, but 393 00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:35,040 Speaker 1: nail making was deadly dull, and made even more so 394 00:29:35,160 --> 00:29:38,560 Speaker 1: by the increasing mechanization of the process, so a number 395 00:29:38,600 --> 00:29:42,240 Speaker 1: of these board nail makers, young William included, turned to 396 00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:50,200 Speaker 1: Birmingham's other versioning industry, making counterfeit coins. Birmingham makers specialized 397 00:29:50,200 --> 00:29:54,360 Speaker 1: in what were called groats, silverish coins with a face 398 00:29:54,440 --> 00:29:58,880 Speaker 1: value of fourpence. Groats weren't commonly made officially, that is, 399 00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:01,760 Speaker 1: but they were easy to counterfeit. You could do it 400 00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:05,240 Speaker 1: if you had access to blacksmithing tools and metals, usually 401 00:30:05,280 --> 00:30:07,800 Speaker 1: pewter or brass, and just a little bit of silver. 402 00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:11,400 Speaker 1: Chalder stayed in Birmingham long enough to pick up the 403 00:30:11,440 --> 00:30:14,959 Speaker 1: basics of metal working. Armed with a new skill, although 404 00:30:15,320 --> 00:30:18,160 Speaker 1: definitely not the one his father had in mind, Chaloner 405 00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:21,560 Speaker 1: left Birmingham for London in the late sixteen eighties. He 406 00:30:21,680 --> 00:30:25,400 Speaker 1: set out on quote St. Francis's mule, that is, on 407 00:30:25,520 --> 00:30:28,720 Speaker 1: foot and probably with nothing more than the clothes on 408 00:30:28,760 --> 00:30:34,520 Speaker 1: his back and his considerable capacity for robes tricks. It 409 00:30:34,560 --> 00:30:37,320 Speaker 1: would have taken William Challenger much more than two days 410 00:30:37,480 --> 00:30:41,600 Speaker 1: to reach London, but when he got there he was 411 00:30:41,640 --> 00:30:59,640 Speaker 1: ready to forge a new future. Act three, equal and opposite. 412 00:31:05,080 --> 00:31:08,400 Speaker 1: Can I interest you in a slide ruler, fousan pain, 413 00:31:08,840 --> 00:31:14,120 Speaker 1: quick silt wiping, pretty silk webbing, all colors? Fine? If 414 00:31:14,200 --> 00:31:20,200 Speaker 1: you can know stilk weaving him miss qui parte in 415 00:31:20,320 --> 00:31:24,320 Speaker 1: six nine. In Swinging London you could buy a lot 416 00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,360 Speaker 1: of exciting things and a ten watch somehow containing a 417 00:31:28,440 --> 00:31:33,600 Speaker 1: dildo in it was one of them dildog watches. Get 418 00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:37,680 Speaker 1: your tin dildo watches here. Now I have no idea 419 00:31:37,760 --> 00:31:40,960 Speaker 1: what to watch containing a dildo actually looked like, or 420 00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:45,280 Speaker 1: what service it was meant to provide, or who would 421 00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:48,160 Speaker 1: have bought it. All of that is totally lost of time. 422 00:31:48,720 --> 00:31:51,360 Speaker 1: But should you be looking for such an item, you 423 00:31:51,480 --> 00:31:54,720 Speaker 1: might have bought it from William Chaloner. Kind interest you 424 00:31:54,760 --> 00:31:58,360 Speaker 1: in a dildo watch, might of the fotieskin. This is 425 00:31:58,360 --> 00:32:01,400 Speaker 1: where young Challenger landed after he pitched up in London 426 00:32:01,600 --> 00:32:07,520 Speaker 1: looking for new opportunities. Chalder wasn't the only peddlers selling oddities, 427 00:32:07,880 --> 00:32:10,160 Speaker 1: but he was one of the smarter kids on the block. 428 00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:16,560 Speaker 1: Here's Tom Levinson again. He was basically a really smart 429 00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:20,640 Speaker 1: street kid who started trying to make money anyway he could, 430 00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:23,720 Speaker 1: and he really didn't care about legal niceties. Challender's metal 431 00:32:23,720 --> 00:32:27,000 Speaker 1: working scale with the tin dildo watches was enough to 432 00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:31,000 Speaker 1: get him noticed. He thereby picked up a few loose 433 00:32:31,080 --> 00:32:38,920 Speaker 1: pens and looser associates, according to his biography, but Chalder 434 00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:42,880 Speaker 1: had his sights set on bigger things. Not long after, 435 00:32:43,080 --> 00:32:45,720 Speaker 1: he and a new found friend decided to set themselves 436 00:32:45,760 --> 00:32:49,720 Speaker 1: up as his pot profits and quack doctors. Do you 437 00:32:49,920 --> 00:32:53,000 Speaker 1: have a pinting in your tommy and in your head? 438 00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:55,840 Speaker 1: I'll have a look at your piss and send you 439 00:32:55,920 --> 00:33:00,000 Speaker 1: to bid. His pot profits were itinerant or street corner 440 00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:03,160 Speaker 1: analysts for lack of a better word, who would look 441 00:33:03,200 --> 00:33:05,640 Speaker 1: at the contents of your chamber pot and tell you 442 00:33:05,680 --> 00:33:09,160 Speaker 1: what was wrong with you quack doctors meant then more 443 00:33:09,240 --> 00:33:11,959 Speaker 1: or less what it means now, although it largely applied 444 00:33:12,000 --> 00:33:15,240 Speaker 1: to people who sold what they claimed were medicines or solves. 445 00:33:16,160 --> 00:33:19,080 Speaker 1: The word came from the Dutch quack solver, which means 446 00:33:19,200 --> 00:33:22,720 Speaker 1: solive hawker, and it implied a lot of shouting. Challenger 447 00:33:22,800 --> 00:33:25,800 Speaker 1: nailed the shouting bit, but then he set himself up 448 00:33:25,840 --> 00:33:29,560 Speaker 1: as a master doctor, meaning someone who had actually studied 449 00:33:29,560 --> 00:33:33,760 Speaker 1: to be a physician. Given the state of medical practice 450 00:33:33,760 --> 00:33:36,760 Speaker 1: at the time, not much differentiated as Charlottean from a 451 00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:41,160 Speaker 1: real physician. However, Challenger was most definitely not qualified to 452 00:33:41,200 --> 00:33:46,320 Speaker 1: dispense medical advice. What Challenger did have, according to his biographer, 453 00:33:47,080 --> 00:33:51,360 Speaker 1: was a gift, the greatest stock of impudence and the 454 00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:55,720 Speaker 1: best neck a tongue petting. He was a talker, he 455 00:33:55,800 --> 00:33:59,920 Speaker 1: was a charmer, and this gift paid off so well 456 00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:03,000 Speaker 1: that he was able to get himself some fine lodgings. 457 00:34:03,480 --> 00:34:06,160 Speaker 1: Quite a feat in London at the time and now 458 00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:09,880 Speaker 1: for a little while, Challenger had a great side scam 459 00:34:09,920 --> 00:34:12,319 Speaker 1: going where he discovers stolen goods for people who had 460 00:34:12,320 --> 00:34:16,279 Speaker 1: been robbed, collecting a reward every time. He continued for 461 00:34:16,320 --> 00:34:19,880 Speaker 1: some time to being suspected to be concerned in the 462 00:34:19,960 --> 00:34:24,000 Speaker 1: robbery himself. He was forced to leave his fine lodgings 463 00:34:24,160 --> 00:34:28,000 Speaker 1: and that learned profession and seek some old Garrett to 464 00:34:28,080 --> 00:34:33,800 Speaker 1: repose his caucassin. After he had to leave his fancier days, 465 00:34:33,920 --> 00:34:37,239 Speaker 1: Challenger set up in Hatton Garden, just outside the London Wall. 466 00:34:37,960 --> 00:34:42,040 Speaker 1: This seems like a setback, but Challenger, according to his biographer, 467 00:34:42,520 --> 00:34:45,680 Speaker 1: was in possession of a quote working brain, and it 468 00:34:45,800 --> 00:34:48,960 Speaker 1: was here that Challenger learned the final skills he needed 469 00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:54,320 Speaker 1: to make it big time. In his drafty Garrett, Challenger 470 00:34:54,400 --> 00:34:58,080 Speaker 1: starts working as a Japanner. Asian lacquer work was all 471 00:34:58,080 --> 00:35:00,320 Speaker 1: the rage of the time, but it was really pensive 472 00:35:00,360 --> 00:35:02,840 Speaker 1: and rare. Japan Ing was a way of faking the 473 00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:06,960 Speaker 1: shiny furniture and cabinetry. This got Challenger into gilding, applying 474 00:35:07,080 --> 00:35:10,640 Speaker 1: a gold finished items, and that obviously led him straight 475 00:35:10,680 --> 00:35:13,800 Speaker 1: to counterfeiting money. He's not going back to build a 476 00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:17,400 Speaker 1: watch pedaling. He realized that there was this whole wonderful 477 00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:21,560 Speaker 1: area of money for actual coins that were after all, 478 00:35:21,600 --> 00:35:23,520 Speaker 1: just discs of metal. And if you could take a 479 00:35:23,600 --> 00:35:26,440 Speaker 1: chunk of cheap metal like lead or tin or something 480 00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:29,640 Speaker 1: and cover it with a skim of silver or what 481 00:35:29,760 --> 00:35:31,840 Speaker 1: have you. All of a sudden you have the shilling 482 00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:34,080 Speaker 1: that only cost you a penny or two. You know, 483 00:35:34,120 --> 00:35:37,239 Speaker 1: that's a nice way to return. Chaloner already knew the 484 00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:40,800 Speaker 1: basics after his apprenticeship in Birmingham, and he was comfortable 485 00:35:40,880 --> 00:35:44,400 Speaker 1: working with hot metal. But though Challenger was proficient in 486 00:35:44,480 --> 00:35:47,840 Speaker 1: making those Birmingham growths, the real money was in the 487 00:35:47,920 --> 00:35:50,800 Speaker 1: higher value coins that were a lot more difficult to fake, 488 00:35:51,560 --> 00:35:56,800 Speaker 1: and of course, our boy Chener is after the real money. 489 00:35:56,920 --> 00:36:00,640 Speaker 1: To do that, he needed a team. It turned out 490 00:36:00,719 --> 00:36:03,880 Speaker 1: that Chaloner was both good at the technical side of 491 00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:07,480 Speaker 1: counterfeiting coins, and he seems to have been a reasonably 492 00:36:07,560 --> 00:36:11,200 Speaker 1: successful leader of small groups. He built little gangs to 493 00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:16,399 Speaker 1: help him make and distribute coins. Certainly by the late 494 00:36:16,440 --> 00:36:19,719 Speaker 1: sixteen eighties and into the sixteen nineties he was a 495 00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:22,160 Speaker 1: clever boy. Are William Yeah? I mean, I think William 496 00:36:22,239 --> 00:36:24,840 Speaker 1: Chaloner he may be kind of like the George Clooney 497 00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:29,359 Speaker 1: character in Oceans eleven, except that you know, he has 498 00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:36,640 Speaker 1: no scruples whatsoever, Armed with street smarts and a charm 499 00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:39,760 Speaker 1: that would give Clooney a run for his money, Challenger 500 00:36:39,960 --> 00:36:44,600 Speaker 1: set up his first gang Challenger found a teacher and 501 00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:48,120 Speaker 1: partner in Patrick Coffee, a London goldsmith. It's Me and 502 00:36:48,200 --> 00:36:52,680 Speaker 1: Your Great Coffee taught Challenger how to prepare metal plates 503 00:36:52,760 --> 00:36:55,239 Speaker 1: that would then be used to punch blanks. He taught 504 00:36:55,280 --> 00:36:57,640 Speaker 1: him the art of guilding. He also taught him how 505 00:36:57,680 --> 00:36:59,840 Speaker 1: to make a coin press to stamp both sides of 506 00:36:59,880 --> 00:37:02,319 Speaker 1: the coin, and a mold that could produce a coin 507 00:37:02,480 --> 00:37:06,480 Speaker 1: with milled edges. Chaloner could now produce the plates in 508 00:37:06,520 --> 00:37:09,440 Speaker 1: the press, but he needed someone more skilled to make 509 00:37:09,480 --> 00:37:12,880 Speaker 1: the dies. A die is the engraved metal stamp that 510 00:37:12,960 --> 00:37:15,279 Speaker 1: presses the image into the coin, and in order for 511 00:37:15,320 --> 00:37:18,040 Speaker 1: the coin to pass muster, it needed to look authentic. 512 00:37:19,960 --> 00:37:24,680 Speaker 1: Challoner found his man in Thomas Taylor, Tyler yoman man. 513 00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:28,200 Speaker 1: If this were a heist movie, Taylor would be the 514 00:37:28,280 --> 00:37:31,040 Speaker 1: quiet guy in spectacles who looks like a librarian, but 515 00:37:31,440 --> 00:37:34,759 Speaker 1: this is a podcast, so use your imagination. In his 516 00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:37,799 Speaker 1: day job, Taylor was an engraver and a printmaker who 517 00:37:37,840 --> 00:37:42,680 Speaker 1: made high quality maps. But printmaking wasn't very profitable, it seems, 518 00:37:42,840 --> 00:37:46,880 Speaker 1: so he signed onto Challenger's crew. Taylor did the die engraving, 519 00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:50,960 Speaker 1: creating reproductions of gold English guineas and French pistols, a 520 00:37:51,040 --> 00:37:56,600 Speaker 1: gold coin worth about seventeen English shillings. Chaloner then tapped 521 00:37:56,640 --> 00:37:59,239 Speaker 1: coffee in his own brother in law, Jack Gravener, to 522 00:37:59,320 --> 00:38:02,759 Speaker 1: be the guilder's Jack, Honey you for some gilding. With 523 00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:06,839 Speaker 1: the team assembled, the operation kicked into high gear. They 524 00:38:06,920 --> 00:38:09,440 Speaker 1: made their first front of coins out of a silver alloy, 525 00:38:09,920 --> 00:38:13,720 Speaker 1: melting the metal in secret in Challenger's lodgings and stamping 526 00:38:13,760 --> 00:38:16,719 Speaker 1: them with the dies tailor Mads. Then Coffee and Gravener 527 00:38:16,840 --> 00:38:19,879 Speaker 1: coated them in a thin layer of gold, and while 528 00:38:19,920 --> 00:38:23,920 Speaker 1: a gold coins heavy enough and precise enough to pass. 529 00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:33,560 Speaker 1: So now Challenger had thousands, thousands of pistols and guineas, 530 00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:36,320 Speaker 1: all high quality and all looking as close to the 531 00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:39,919 Speaker 1: real deal as possible. He now needed people to pass 532 00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:42,800 Speaker 1: the coins into the market, an act called uttering. He 533 00:38:42,920 --> 00:38:45,960 Speaker 1: turned to his friend Thomas Holloway and Holloway's wife Elizabeth 534 00:38:46,360 --> 00:38:49,279 Speaker 1: to unload the goods on local petty criminals, setting a 535 00:38:49,400 --> 00:38:54,400 Speaker 1: price of eleven shillings on each coin. Yeah, eleven shillings 536 00:38:54,480 --> 00:38:58,200 Speaker 1: eight how many will you take, sir? Then he sat 537 00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:04,080 Speaker 1: back and watched as the money, real, actual not fake money, 538 00:39:04,719 --> 00:39:08,799 Speaker 1: poured in or as his biographer but it, and now 539 00:39:08,960 --> 00:39:11,720 Speaker 1: he seemed to have found the so much thought after 540 00:39:11,920 --> 00:39:16,719 Speaker 1: Philosopher's Stone, or like Dannay from Jove, had showers of 541 00:39:16,880 --> 00:39:22,280 Speaker 1: gold daily falling into his lap. Everything seemed to favor 542 00:39:22,520 --> 00:39:29,799 Speaker 1: his undertakings. Practically overnight, Challenger was rich, really really rich, 543 00:39:30,120 --> 00:39:32,920 Speaker 1: like moved to a fancy house in a wealthy neighborhood 544 00:39:33,000 --> 00:39:36,520 Speaker 1: by all new clothes. Rich life. For William Challenger and 545 00:39:36,640 --> 00:39:40,480 Speaker 1: his gang, it's going very well. Indeed, now all he 546 00:39:40,560 --> 00:39:43,400 Speaker 1: needs to do is keep his head down, stay ahead 547 00:39:43,440 --> 00:39:47,400 Speaker 1: of the law, and keep churning out coins. And that 548 00:39:47,480 --> 00:40:00,040 Speaker 1: can't be too hard. Right this season on new in 549 00:40:00,160 --> 00:40:06,440 Speaker 1: his law, Newson was absolutely particulous in everything that he did. 550 00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:09,560 Speaker 1: I swear that I will not reveal or discover to 551 00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:14,320 Speaker 1: any person or persons whatsoever the new invention of rounding 552 00:40:14,440 --> 00:40:20,600 Speaker 1: the money, So help me God. Money still continuing exceeding scarce. 553 00:40:21,400 --> 00:40:23,759 Speaker 1: So the nun was paid or received, but all was 554 00:40:23,880 --> 00:40:29,040 Speaker 1: untrust the mint not supplying for common necessities. So it's 555 00:40:29,120 --> 00:40:33,360 Speaker 1: very ramshackle institution by this point in history. Now England 556 00:40:33,480 --> 00:40:36,759 Speaker 1: have been more grieved with clipton counterfeit money than any 557 00:40:36,800 --> 00:40:39,920 Speaker 1: other country. Everybody was degrading the coinage because it was 558 00:40:39,960 --> 00:40:43,360 Speaker 1: in such a poor state anyway, I saw in William 559 00:40:43,640 --> 00:40:47,560 Speaker 1: Challoner's brother in law's house cutters and tools instruments proper 560 00:40:47,640 --> 00:40:51,640 Speaker 1: for coining. Nora might provide it with any competent assistance 561 00:40:51,719 --> 00:40:55,600 Speaker 1: to enable me to grapple with an undertaking sore, vexatious 562 00:40:55,840 --> 00:41:01,000 Speaker 1: and dangerous as this that despite low thing, this actual 563 00:41:01,080 --> 00:41:03,960 Speaker 1: work is doing an awful lot of it in a 564 00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:06,920 Speaker 1: way that you might expect from a police inspector and 565 00:41:07,440 --> 00:41:11,880 Speaker 1: a judge and prosecution today. In many ways, damn my 566 00:41:12,080 --> 00:41:14,719 Speaker 1: blood might have been out by now of the word 567 00:41:14,800 --> 00:41:21,960 Speaker 1: for him, He's a rogue. Newton's Law is a production 568 00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:24,719 Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. It's written and hosted by Me, 569 00:41:25,000 --> 00:41:29,200 Speaker 1: Linda Rodriguez McRobie. Our senior producer is Ryan Murdoch. Our 570 00:41:29,280 --> 00:41:33,760 Speaker 1: producer is Emily Marina. Our executive producer is Jason English. 571 00:41:34,160 --> 00:41:38,080 Speaker 1: Original music by Alice McCoy with editing help from Mary Do, 572 00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:42,520 Speaker 1: Sound design and mixing by Jeremy Thal, Research in fact 573 00:41:42,600 --> 00:41:46,400 Speaker 1: checking by me and Jocelyn Sears. Voice acting by Keith Flemming, 574 00:41:46,520 --> 00:41:51,080 Speaker 1: Mark McDonald, Robert Jack and Austin Rodriguez mcgrabi. Special thanks 575 00:41:51,120 --> 00:41:55,240 Speaker 1: to Chris Barker, Dr Patricia Ferre and Tom Levinson. Special 576 00:41:55,320 --> 00:41:59,120 Speaker 1: thanks to mangest Hat to Kudur and Fineflex Sound Studios 577 00:41:59,680 --> 00:42:03,960 Speaker 1: are show logo is designed by Lucy Condonia Thanks for listening. 578 00:42:11,120 --> 00:42:19,040 Speaker 1: Exotic Parrots, Exotic Birds, Exotic Birds ads, Half Fries PlayStation 579 00:42:19,280 --> 00:42:22,000 Speaker 1: for miss just spell off a truck