1 00:00:04,080 --> 00:00:07,440 Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of 2 00:00:07,480 --> 00:00:14,440 Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of 3 00:00:14,480 --> 00:00:18,440 Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all 4 00:00:18,480 --> 00:00:22,119 Speaker 1: of these amazing tales are right there on display, just 5 00:00:22,200 --> 00:00:28,840 Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. 6 00:00:36,440 --> 00:00:40,640 Speaker 1: Humans are incredible engineers. We've rarely met an engineering problem 7 00:00:40,680 --> 00:00:43,240 Speaker 1: we couldn't solve. But as I'm sure you've heard before, 8 00:00:43,280 --> 00:00:45,920 Speaker 1: sometimes humanity gets so caught up in whether it can 9 00:00:46,000 --> 00:00:48,960 Speaker 1: do something it forgets to ask whether it should. Such 10 00:00:49,120 --> 00:00:51,280 Speaker 1: was the case in the late nineteen sixties when the 11 00:00:51,360 --> 00:00:54,840 Speaker 1: US government became aware of a sunken Russian submarine and 12 00:00:54,880 --> 00:00:57,240 Speaker 1: stopped at nothing to retrieve it from the bottom of 13 00:00:57,280 --> 00:01:02,480 Speaker 1: the sea. The K one submarine sunk sometime around March 14 00:01:02,520 --> 00:01:05,720 Speaker 1: of nineteen sixty eight for reasons that will never be known. 15 00:01:06,120 --> 00:01:08,600 Speaker 1: All the CIA did know was that the Russians were 16 00:01:08,600 --> 00:01:12,560 Speaker 1: conducting a massive search and rescue operation in the Pacific Ocean, 17 00:01:12,840 --> 00:01:16,520 Speaker 1: fifteen hundred miles north of Hawaii. Once the Russians gave up, 18 00:01:16,600 --> 00:01:19,600 Speaker 1: an American sub moved in using special cameras. The Russian 19 00:01:19,680 --> 00:01:22,800 Speaker 1: vessels didn't have. The American sub revealed the K one 20 00:01:22,920 --> 00:01:25,520 Speaker 1: twenty nine was intact at the bottom of the ocean, 21 00:01:25,880 --> 00:01:29,360 Speaker 1: and if recovered, could provide the CIA with Russian missile 22 00:01:29,400 --> 00:01:33,200 Speaker 1: technology and codebooks filled with secrets. But of course this 23 00:01:33,240 --> 00:01:36,360 Speaker 1: would be no easy retrieval mission. The sub was sixteen 24 00:01:36,440 --> 00:01:39,600 Speaker 1: thousy five hundred feet down. It was one thing to 25 00:01:39,640 --> 00:01:43,280 Speaker 1: have an American sub take pictures, but having divers searching 26 00:01:43,319 --> 00:01:45,600 Speaker 1: the debris at that depth was out of the question, 27 00:01:46,040 --> 00:01:48,080 Speaker 1: and the wreck of the sub was so big it 28 00:01:48,120 --> 00:01:52,559 Speaker 1: would take some incredible machinery to recover it. The deeply paranoid, 29 00:01:52,800 --> 00:01:56,160 Speaker 1: ethically dubious CIA of this time was not willing to 30 00:01:56,280 --> 00:01:59,280 Speaker 1: let the opportunity slide, though, and so they embarked on 31 00:01:59,320 --> 00:02:02,560 Speaker 1: a multi million dollar project to design a vessel capable 32 00:02:02,840 --> 00:02:05,240 Speaker 1: of pulling K one twenty nine from the bottom of 33 00:02:05,280 --> 00:02:10,280 Speaker 1: the sea, codename Project Azorian. They would need a cover story, 34 00:02:10,320 --> 00:02:12,720 Speaker 1: and so the CIA reached out to none other than 35 00:02:12,840 --> 00:02:16,600 Speaker 1: eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes to lend his name to the project. 36 00:02:16,880 --> 00:02:20,480 Speaker 1: The CIA would call their ship the Hughes Glomar Explorer, 37 00:02:20,720 --> 00:02:22,560 Speaker 1: and Hughes would tell the public that it was his 38 00:02:22,680 --> 00:02:26,480 Speaker 1: ship being constructed to use in deep sea mining operations. 39 00:02:27,200 --> 00:02:30,240 Speaker 1: The CIA then hired a team of engineers, swearing them 40 00:02:30,240 --> 00:02:32,720 Speaker 1: all to secrecy and even keeping some in the dark 41 00:02:32,760 --> 00:02:35,720 Speaker 1: as to the true nature of the vessel. The Explorer 42 00:02:35,919 --> 00:02:38,919 Speaker 1: was an engineering marvel. At six hundred and eighteen feet 43 00:02:38,960 --> 00:02:42,519 Speaker 1: in length. The ship had the largest moon pull ever constructed, 44 00:02:42,760 --> 00:02:44,959 Speaker 1: which is an opening at the bottom of the vessel 45 00:02:45,200 --> 00:02:49,200 Speaker 1: that allows submersibles to be deployed or in this case, retrieved. 46 00:02:49,760 --> 00:02:51,880 Speaker 1: Two doors would open at the bottom of the ship, 47 00:02:52,040 --> 00:02:55,600 Speaker 1: releasing Clementine, the name for a giant claw that was 48 00:02:55,600 --> 00:02:57,400 Speaker 1: to be lowered to the bottom of the sea to 49 00:02:57,480 --> 00:03:01,280 Speaker 1: retrieve K one twenty nine. Clementine was attached to massive 50 00:03:01,360 --> 00:03:04,320 Speaker 1: lengths of steel pipe that could be slowly doled out 51 00:03:04,320 --> 00:03:07,280 Speaker 1: to lower the claw farther and farther down. The whole 52 00:03:07,320 --> 00:03:11,320 Speaker 1: apparatus was capable of lifting over twenty one million pounds, 53 00:03:11,960 --> 00:03:15,400 Speaker 1: but halfway through the construction process, the engineers realized that 54 00:03:15,440 --> 00:03:18,240 Speaker 1: they had made a mistake. To put it in simple terms, 55 00:03:18,280 --> 00:03:21,120 Speaker 1: the ship wasn't big enough to support the claw and 56 00:03:21,320 --> 00:03:24,480 Speaker 1: was likely to break in half during the operation. The 57 00:03:24,520 --> 00:03:27,080 Speaker 1: CIA had to spend even more money and make the 58 00:03:27,120 --> 00:03:30,400 Speaker 1: ship even bigger. The problem with this the ship was 59 00:03:30,440 --> 00:03:33,160 Speaker 1: now too big to fit through the Panama Canal, and 60 00:03:33,200 --> 00:03:36,160 Speaker 1: so once it set sail from the east coast of America, 61 00:03:36,240 --> 00:03:38,320 Speaker 1: it would have to travel all the way around South 62 00:03:38,360 --> 00:03:42,080 Speaker 1: America to reach its target. The ship was finally completed, 63 00:03:42,240 --> 00:03:46,160 Speaker 1: costing the American taxpayer nearly three hundred million dollars. It 64 00:03:46,200 --> 00:03:49,080 Speaker 1: began its long journey to the Pacific in nineteen seventy three, 65 00:03:49,400 --> 00:03:52,160 Speaker 1: nearly getting delayed in Chile by a revolution there, but 66 00:03:52,360 --> 00:03:55,760 Speaker 1: ultimately making it to its target without issue. The process 67 00:03:55,800 --> 00:03:59,480 Speaker 1: of actually lowering the claw Clementine took weeks. Once it 68 00:03:59,520 --> 00:04:01,760 Speaker 1: finally reached the K one twenty nine at the bottom 69 00:04:01,800 --> 00:04:04,720 Speaker 1: of the ocean, the claw successfully grasped the sub in 70 00:04:04,800 --> 00:04:08,560 Speaker 1: its pinchers, lifting it from its longtime resting place, But 71 00:04:08,680 --> 00:04:11,360 Speaker 1: as the sub was slowly lifted back up over thousands 72 00:04:11,400 --> 00:04:16,240 Speaker 1: of feet, disaster struck. Parts of the claw failed, snapping 73 00:04:16,240 --> 00:04:18,599 Speaker 1: off and allowing a majority of the sub to fall 74 00:04:18,640 --> 00:04:22,279 Speaker 1: back to the ocean floor. The steel just wasn't strong enough. 75 00:04:22,520 --> 00:04:24,920 Speaker 1: The crewmen had to settle for lifting the remaining piece 76 00:04:24,960 --> 00:04:27,560 Speaker 1: of the sub up into their ship and heading home. 77 00:04:28,320 --> 00:04:32,280 Speaker 1: It's unknown what exactly the CIA learned if anything from 78 00:04:32,279 --> 00:04:35,440 Speaker 1: the recovered piece of the sub. They actually intended on 79 00:04:35,600 --> 00:04:38,560 Speaker 1: authorizing a second mission to return to the site and 80 00:04:38,640 --> 00:04:41,760 Speaker 1: try to recover the rest, but before that could happen, 81 00:04:42,040 --> 00:04:45,360 Speaker 1: American journalists finally caught wind of the project and leaked 82 00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:48,400 Speaker 1: details to the public. The general consensus seemed to be 83 00:04:48,480 --> 00:04:52,240 Speaker 1: that another recovery mission wasn't worth the cost, and so 84 00:04:52,800 --> 00:04:55,719 Speaker 1: most of K one twenty nine remains where it came 85 00:04:55,760 --> 00:04:58,479 Speaker 1: to rest at the bottom of the ocean, and any 86 00:04:58,520 --> 00:05:01,839 Speaker 1: secrets it might have held are lost to time. Curiously, 87 00:05:01,920 --> 00:05:04,599 Speaker 1: the Russians have never made attempts of their own to 88 00:05:04,680 --> 00:05:07,719 Speaker 1: recover the sub, a sign that nothing of value is 89 00:05:07,760 --> 00:05:10,920 Speaker 1: really on board, or just an admission of a pretty 90 00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:14,599 Speaker 1: big truth. Sixteen thousand feet of water is a pretty 91 00:05:14,640 --> 00:05:31,240 Speaker 1: safe way to hide a secret. It's a well documented 92 00:05:31,279 --> 00:05:34,839 Speaker 1: fact that pregnancy can bring on some pretty intense food cravings. 93 00:05:35,000 --> 00:05:38,400 Speaker 1: Women have reported desires for everything from pizza and ice 94 00:05:38,400 --> 00:05:41,800 Speaker 1: cream to stranger food combinations like pickles with peanut butter 95 00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:45,159 Speaker 1: or chocolate cake with ketchup. And then there was Mary, 96 00:05:45,440 --> 00:05:48,760 Speaker 1: an eighteenth century servant girl who allegedly developed a craving 97 00:05:48,800 --> 00:05:52,320 Speaker 1: for rabbit meat. A craving so powerful it altered her mind, 98 00:05:52,400 --> 00:05:56,240 Speaker 1: the unborn child she was carrying, and eventually all of England. 99 00:05:57,279 --> 00:06:00,640 Speaker 1: The story begins one afternoon in April of seventeen twenty six, 100 00:06:00,760 --> 00:06:04,239 Speaker 1: while Mary was weeding a field outside her village near London. 101 00:06:04,560 --> 00:06:07,280 Speaker 1: Mary was several months pregnant at this point, but as 102 00:06:07,320 --> 00:06:10,400 Speaker 1: a poor servant girl in the eighteenth century, taking tiba 103 00:06:10,520 --> 00:06:13,359 Speaker 1: from work wasn't an option, so she was down on 104 00:06:13,440 --> 00:06:16,000 Speaker 1: her hands and knees pulling weeds and trying not to 105 00:06:16,040 --> 00:06:18,800 Speaker 1: think about how uncomfortable she was when she looked up 106 00:06:19,080 --> 00:06:22,840 Speaker 1: and spotted a rabbit. Now, rabbit meat was expensive at 107 00:06:22,839 --> 00:06:25,400 Speaker 1: the time, and Mary had three hungry kids and a 108 00:06:25,480 --> 00:06:28,719 Speaker 1: husband at home, so she didn't think twice. She took 109 00:06:28,760 --> 00:06:31,240 Speaker 1: off after the rabbit and almost had it in her 110 00:06:31,279 --> 00:06:34,320 Speaker 1: grasp before it slipped under a fence and disappeared into 111 00:06:34,320 --> 00:06:37,200 Speaker 1: the woods. To say that Mary was disappointed would be 112 00:06:37,279 --> 00:06:41,120 Speaker 1: an understatement. That night, she lay awake imagining all of 113 00:06:41,120 --> 00:06:44,640 Speaker 1: the delicious meals the creature could have become. Braised rabbit, 114 00:06:44,920 --> 00:06:49,000 Speaker 1: poached rabbit, rabbit pie, rabbit stew. Her mouth just watered 115 00:06:49,000 --> 00:06:51,080 Speaker 1: from the thought of it all, and over the next 116 00:06:51,160 --> 00:06:54,360 Speaker 1: few weeks that craving only got worse. Mary begged her 117 00:06:54,440 --> 00:06:57,960 Speaker 1: husband to buy her rabbit meat, but with his business struggling, 118 00:06:57,960 --> 00:07:00,840 Speaker 1: they just simply couldn't afford it. A short while later, 119 00:07:01,080 --> 00:07:05,040 Speaker 1: Mary suffered a painful miscarriage. Afterwards, she expected the cravings 120 00:07:05,080 --> 00:07:07,920 Speaker 1: to fade, but they only got worse. She continued to 121 00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:11,320 Speaker 1: dream and obsess about eating rabbits until one day she 122 00:07:11,360 --> 00:07:14,640 Speaker 1: fell strangely ill. At first, no one knew what was 123 00:07:14,680 --> 00:07:17,880 Speaker 1: wrong with her. Then the cramp started, followed by full 124 00:07:17,960 --> 00:07:22,080 Speaker 1: on contractions. Mary, it seems, was going into labor, which 125 00:07:22,200 --> 00:07:25,000 Speaker 1: didn't make sense because she had already lost her baby. 126 00:07:25,360 --> 00:07:28,040 Speaker 1: Her family sent for the doctor, a man named John Howard, 127 00:07:28,320 --> 00:07:30,760 Speaker 1: but by the time he arrived, Mary was already done. 128 00:07:30,960 --> 00:07:33,800 Speaker 1: She presented him with a thing she had birthed. It 129 00:07:33,920 --> 00:07:38,760 Speaker 1: wasn't a human child, but several infant rabbits. Horrifically, most 130 00:07:38,760 --> 00:07:41,400 Speaker 1: of the animals came out crushed or in small pieces, 131 00:07:41,680 --> 00:07:45,679 Speaker 1: and were all stillborn. Howard examined the fragments but refused 132 00:07:45,680 --> 00:07:48,160 Speaker 1: to believe that Mary had produced them, at least until 133 00:07:48,200 --> 00:07:51,440 Speaker 1: she went into labor again. Over the next few days, 134 00:07:51,640 --> 00:07:56,040 Speaker 1: she delivered batch after batch of dismembered bunnies. He documented 135 00:07:56,040 --> 00:07:58,880 Speaker 1: the berths and stored the parts in jars for later study. 136 00:07:59,360 --> 00:08:02,720 Speaker 1: In between the frequent birthing sessions, though, Howard wrote letters 137 00:08:02,760 --> 00:08:05,960 Speaker 1: to England's top scientists, who flocked to the village to 138 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:09,880 Speaker 1: see the phenomenon for themselves. Eventually, the King's personal physician 139 00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:12,640 Speaker 1: was sent to investigate. He was so impressed by what 140 00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:15,680 Speaker 1: he witnessed he published a statement declaring that the rabbit 141 00:08:15,720 --> 00:08:20,480 Speaker 1: births were a genuine medical phenomenon. Meanwhile, Mary had become 142 00:08:20,520 --> 00:08:24,600 Speaker 1: a celebrity. Her story made national headlines, sparking heated debates 143 00:08:24,600 --> 00:08:28,320 Speaker 1: between skeptics and believers. Those who were convinced pointed to 144 00:08:28,360 --> 00:08:31,640 Speaker 1: the theory of maternal impression, which hold that a mother's 145 00:08:31,680 --> 00:08:35,240 Speaker 1: thoughts can physically alter the body of the unborn child, 146 00:08:35,520 --> 00:08:39,240 Speaker 1: resulting in marks or birth defects. To many experts at 147 00:08:39,280 --> 00:08:41,760 Speaker 1: the time, there was little doubt about what had happened. 148 00:08:42,040 --> 00:08:45,760 Speaker 1: Mary's cravings for rabbit flesh had turned her child into 149 00:08:45,800 --> 00:08:49,719 Speaker 1: the object of her obsession. It's a disturbing thought and 150 00:08:49,880 --> 00:08:54,040 Speaker 1: fortunately impossible. Today, the theory of maternal impression has been 151 00:08:54,160 --> 00:08:58,240 Speaker 1: resoundingly discredited, and the same can be said for Mary's story. 152 00:08:58,720 --> 00:09:01,680 Speaker 1: You see her husband, as and some accomplices were eventually 153 00:09:01,720 --> 00:09:05,440 Speaker 1: caught smuggling rabbits into her room. They'd been cutting the 154 00:09:05,480 --> 00:09:09,640 Speaker 1: animals into pieces themselves, and Mary had been well putting 155 00:09:09,640 --> 00:09:13,080 Speaker 1: them where babies come from. They'd hoped all the attention 156 00:09:13,160 --> 00:09:15,960 Speaker 1: would make them wildly rich, but instead they became the 157 00:09:16,000 --> 00:09:19,480 Speaker 1: subject of ridicule and scorn, and while they managed to 158 00:09:19,480 --> 00:09:22,920 Speaker 1: avoid any criminal charges, they never profited a dime from 159 00:09:22,920 --> 00:09:27,200 Speaker 1: the incident. Mary eventually faded into obscurity, but the doctors 160 00:09:27,240 --> 00:09:30,960 Speaker 1: who vouched for her weren't so lucky. Several careers were ruined, 161 00:09:31,200 --> 00:09:34,880 Speaker 1: and trust in the medical community plummeted for years to come. 162 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:38,440 Speaker 1: The nation, scientists were viewed as gullible fools, so eager 163 00:09:38,520 --> 00:09:41,520 Speaker 1: to prove their unfounded theories that they would convince themselves 164 00:09:41,559 --> 00:09:45,280 Speaker 1: of the impossible, and that criticism may have been warranted. 165 00:09:45,559 --> 00:09:47,960 Speaker 1: It shouldn't have taken a medical degree to know that 166 00:09:48,000 --> 00:09:50,959 Speaker 1: women don't give birth to rabbits, but that didn't stop 167 00:09:51,000 --> 00:09:54,040 Speaker 1: Mary Toft from giving birth to a hoax that most 168 00:09:54,080 --> 00:10:01,319 Speaker 1: people would describe as hair brained. I hope you've enjoyed 169 00:10:01,320 --> 00:10:05,080 Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for 170 00:10:05,120 --> 00:10:07,920 Speaker 1: free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show 171 00:10:07,960 --> 00:10:13,000 Speaker 1: by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created 172 00:10:13,040 --> 00:10:16,320 Speaker 1: by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works. 173 00:10:16,760 --> 00:10:19,880 Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is 174 00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:23,400 Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can 175 00:10:23,480 --> 00:10:27,320 Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the Worldoflore dot com. 176 00:10:27,360 --> 00:10:31,520 Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious.