1 00:00:04,080 --> 00:00:07,480 Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Benky's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of 2 00:00:07,480 --> 00:00:13,840 Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is 3 00:00:13,960 --> 00:00:17,960 Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, 4 00:00:18,280 --> 00:00:21,640 Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display, 5 00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:27,600 Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet 6 00:00:27,840 --> 00:00:39,960 Speaker 1: of Curiosities. The Founding Fathers were brilliant, yet flawed individuals. 7 00:00:40,159 --> 00:00:43,000 Speaker 1: They undertook a brazen act of rebellion to free their 8 00:00:43,040 --> 00:00:45,600 Speaker 1: country of tyranny by using the most powerful tool in 9 00:00:45,640 --> 00:00:49,479 Speaker 1: their arsenal, not guns or canons, but their minds. They 10 00:00:49,520 --> 00:00:52,839 Speaker 1: believed in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But 11 00:00:52,960 --> 00:00:56,400 Speaker 1: do you know what they didn't believe in dinosaurs. It 12 00:00:56,480 --> 00:00:59,560 Speaker 1: all started a hundred years prior, during the six hundreds, 13 00:00:59,600 --> 00:01:02,280 Speaker 1: with a man Robert Plott. Plot was born in England 14 00:01:02,320 --> 00:01:05,319 Speaker 1: around sixteen forty. He focused hard on his studies and 15 00:01:05,360 --> 00:01:08,319 Speaker 1: attended good schools as a child, eventually going on to 16 00:01:08,400 --> 00:01:11,200 Speaker 1: study at Oxford. He graduated some years later with a 17 00:01:11,240 --> 00:01:14,759 Speaker 1: bachelor's degree, a master's and a degree in civil law. 18 00:01:15,480 --> 00:01:18,920 Speaker 1: Plot moved up quickly within the university. Post graduation. He 19 00:01:19,120 --> 00:01:22,120 Speaker 1: became a professor as well as dean and vice principal 20 00:01:22,200 --> 00:01:25,800 Speaker 1: for a time. He also oversaw three scientific departments at 21 00:01:25,800 --> 00:01:29,720 Speaker 1: the school, including the Chemistry Lab, the Ashmolean Museum, and 22 00:01:29,760 --> 00:01:34,240 Speaker 1: the School of Natural History. Plot was interested in natural history, 23 00:01:34,400 --> 00:01:38,080 Speaker 1: specifically the ancient natural history of Oxfordshire, County, where he 24 00:01:38,120 --> 00:01:40,760 Speaker 1: had lived. He approached his study of the area in 25 00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:43,319 Speaker 1: a far more calculated way than the researchers of the 26 00:01:43,360 --> 00:01:47,200 Speaker 1: past and even several of his contemporaries. He kept detailed 27 00:01:47,200 --> 00:01:50,320 Speaker 1: notes about his travels, tracking the owners of the properties 28 00:01:50,360 --> 00:01:53,800 Speaker 1: he visited, as well as rich descriptions of what he found. 29 00:01:54,400 --> 00:01:57,760 Speaker 1: Plot categorized his findings under chapter headings with names like 30 00:01:58,320 --> 00:02:02,400 Speaker 1: of the Heavens and Air End of Plants. However, there 31 00:02:02,480 --> 00:02:04,960 Speaker 1: was one heading that seemed to jump off the page 32 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:07,920 Speaker 1: more than the others. It was the one titled of 33 00:02:08,160 --> 00:02:13,240 Speaker 1: formed stones two Plot. Formed stones were rocks and minerals 34 00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:16,600 Speaker 1: that resembled parts of the body, both human and animal. 35 00:02:17,040 --> 00:02:20,160 Speaker 1: There were small spherical rocks that looked like eyes, and 36 00:02:20,320 --> 00:02:23,480 Speaker 1: larger stones with indentations that bore a resemblance to the 37 00:02:23,560 --> 00:02:26,640 Speaker 1: human brain. But there was one stone in particular that 38 00:02:26,639 --> 00:02:29,720 Speaker 1: caught his attention, except it wasn't a stone at all. 39 00:02:30,120 --> 00:02:34,120 Speaker 1: It was a fossilized bone, and it was massive, larger 40 00:02:34,160 --> 00:02:37,079 Speaker 1: than any human bone he had ever seen before. Plot 41 00:02:37,120 --> 00:02:39,000 Speaker 1: first thought it had come from an extinct form of 42 00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:41,720 Speaker 1: elephant that had roamed the land when the ancient Romans 43 00:02:41,720 --> 00:02:44,720 Speaker 1: were still in power, but soon tossed that theory out. 44 00:02:45,160 --> 00:02:47,200 Speaker 1: There was no way an elephant of that kind would 45 00:02:47,200 --> 00:02:50,160 Speaker 1: have ended up in this part of England. Instead, he 46 00:02:50,240 --> 00:02:52,760 Speaker 1: deduced that the bone must have come from the femur 47 00:02:52,800 --> 00:02:55,919 Speaker 1: of a long deceased giant he knew of giants from 48 00:02:55,919 --> 00:02:59,320 Speaker 1: the past, like Orestes, the son of Agamemnon, who measured 49 00:02:59,360 --> 00:03:03,200 Speaker 1: over eleven feet tall. There were Secondilla and Pussio, the 50 00:03:03,280 --> 00:03:06,720 Speaker 1: keepers of the Roman gardens of Sellust. They both topped 51 00:03:06,720 --> 00:03:09,200 Speaker 1: out at around nine and a half feet tall, and 52 00:03:09,280 --> 00:03:12,120 Speaker 1: so it wasn't out of line with assumptions that this 53 00:03:12,200 --> 00:03:14,800 Speaker 1: bone also had once belonged to a man or woman 54 00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:19,400 Speaker 1: much larger than everyone else. Plot published his findings, Giant 55 00:03:19,480 --> 00:03:23,760 Speaker 1: Hypothesis and all, in his book Natural History of Oxfordshire 56 00:03:23,960 --> 00:03:28,320 Speaker 1: around sixteen seventy six. So how did Robert Plott's wildly 57 00:03:28,360 --> 00:03:31,480 Speaker 1: inaccurate theory about fossils pertained to the founding Fathers. One 58 00:03:31,520 --> 00:03:35,360 Speaker 1: hundred years later. Well in seventeen sixty seven, Benjamin Franklin 59 00:03:35,400 --> 00:03:37,680 Speaker 1: received a package while he was in London on a 60 00:03:37,720 --> 00:03:40,480 Speaker 1: diplomatic mission. He opened it up to find an array 61 00:03:40,520 --> 00:03:43,080 Speaker 1: of bones, teeth, and tusks that had been found in 62 00:03:43,080 --> 00:03:46,440 Speaker 1: the Ohio River Valley back in America. They appeared to 63 00:03:46,480 --> 00:03:49,880 Speaker 1: belong to an elephant. He found the teeth fascinating, as 64 00:03:49,920 --> 00:03:52,440 Speaker 1: they didn't look like the teeth of modern elephants. They 65 00:03:52,440 --> 00:03:56,160 Speaker 1: had numerous protuberances and divots, like the teeth found on 66 00:03:56,240 --> 00:03:59,680 Speaker 1: most carnivores, at least according to Franklin, so he took 67 00:03:59,680 --> 00:04:01,920 Speaker 1: the files to the scientists that he knew where. It 68 00:04:02,040 --> 00:04:04,600 Speaker 1: was speculated that they had come from a large elephant 69 00:04:04,680 --> 00:04:07,960 Speaker 1: like creature that no longer existed. It would be almost 70 00:04:08,000 --> 00:04:12,040 Speaker 1: one fifty years before British geologist William Buckland would discover 71 00:04:12,120 --> 00:04:15,680 Speaker 1: the remains of a creature he named Megalosaurus. They'd become 72 00:04:15,760 --> 00:04:18,800 Speaker 1: the first known fossils belonging to a dinosaur, though the 73 00:04:18,920 --> 00:04:22,760 Speaker 1: term dinosaur wouldn't be coined for another twenty years. It's 74 00:04:22,839 --> 00:04:25,760 Speaker 1: possible that the giant bone Robert Plott had found had 75 00:04:25,800 --> 00:04:29,279 Speaker 1: also belonged to a dinosaur, but nobody knew such animals 76 00:04:29,279 --> 00:04:33,360 Speaker 1: had ever lived. In fact, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin 77 00:04:33,680 --> 00:04:38,160 Speaker 1: lived until the seventeen nineties, thirty years before Buckland's Megalosaurus 78 00:04:38,160 --> 00:04:41,520 Speaker 1: shook the world of science, meaning that two of America's 79 00:04:41,520 --> 00:04:46,599 Speaker 1: founding fathers died believing the giants were real, but never 80 00:04:46,720 --> 00:04:51,520 Speaker 1: knowing that dinosaurs had ever existed at all. And I'd 81 00:04:51,560 --> 00:05:08,080 Speaker 1: call that curious. The stage of piracy has something of 82 00:05:08,160 --> 00:05:12,160 Speaker 1: an immortalizing effect on its players. Modern audiences swoon over 83 00:05:12,200 --> 00:05:16,520 Speaker 1: the idea of a carefree, swashbuckling existence, often exemplified in 84 00:05:16,560 --> 00:05:20,120 Speaker 1: the exploits of historical people like Ann Bonnie and Henry Caesar, 85 00:05:20,520 --> 00:05:23,560 Speaker 1: and over modern and fictional names like Jack Sparrow and 86 00:05:23,720 --> 00:05:28,160 Speaker 1: Elizabeth Swan. But not every pirate is romanticized into such 87 00:05:28,279 --> 00:05:32,240 Speaker 1: prominent roles in the lore surrounding their profession. During the 88 00:05:32,240 --> 00:05:36,080 Speaker 1: extended conflict between Spain and England, countless pirate legends were 89 00:05:36,120 --> 00:05:40,320 Speaker 1: born from the indelible Edward Thatch code named Blackbeard, to 90 00:05:40,400 --> 00:05:44,000 Speaker 1: the likes of Calico, Jack Black, Sam Bellamy, and many 91 00:05:44,040 --> 00:05:47,839 Speaker 1: many more. The stories of pirates and privateers all have 92 00:05:48,040 --> 00:05:52,680 Speaker 1: a relatively similar beginning point. Struggles turned to opportunity and 93 00:05:52,839 --> 00:05:56,919 Speaker 1: a similar ending point capture and or death. And while 94 00:05:57,000 --> 00:05:59,839 Speaker 1: that is where Henry began, it is not where Henry 95 00:05:59,839 --> 00:06:02,839 Speaker 1: and did. As a boy, Henry found himself as a 96 00:06:02,920 --> 00:06:06,080 Speaker 1: servant in Barbados. When a call to raid the Spanish 97 00:06:06,120 --> 00:06:09,599 Speaker 1: reached Henry, he was quick to answer, finding gainful employment 98 00:06:09,720 --> 00:06:13,240 Speaker 1: as a privateer under Christopher Mings. And it was also 99 00:06:13,320 --> 00:06:16,560 Speaker 1: around this time, in the mid sixteen hundreds, that rum 100 00:06:16,720 --> 00:06:20,760 Speaker 1: began to make the rounds aboard numerous privateer and pirate vessels, 101 00:06:20,760 --> 00:06:24,920 Speaker 1: becoming the unspoken signature beverage of marauding sailors all over 102 00:06:24,960 --> 00:06:27,640 Speaker 1: the world. It's easy to imagine that among the spoils 103 00:06:27,680 --> 00:06:30,680 Speaker 1: of war and piracy, Henry often found himself with a 104 00:06:30,720 --> 00:06:34,279 Speaker 1: glass in hand, a barrel in the hold, perhaps under foot, 105 00:06:34,680 --> 00:06:36,880 Speaker 1: and a pocket of gold amassed from the sale of 106 00:06:36,920 --> 00:06:41,160 Speaker 1: the native Caribbean drink. Henry established himself as a premier 107 00:06:41,200 --> 00:06:44,720 Speaker 1: privateer against the Spanish fleet in the seas around Jamaica. 108 00:06:45,160 --> 00:06:48,000 Speaker 1: He served as captain with the defenses when Spain sent 109 00:06:48,040 --> 00:06:51,120 Speaker 1: their own invasion against the British stronghold in Jamaica, a 110 00:06:51,120 --> 00:06:54,599 Speaker 1: defense that held and proved Henry the security of buying 111 00:06:54,680 --> 00:06:57,719 Speaker 1: his own plantation on the island, which had quickly become 112 00:06:57,760 --> 00:07:01,760 Speaker 1: his home. All told, Henry's exploits are not to be ignored. 113 00:07:01,800 --> 00:07:05,040 Speaker 1: Among the most successful pirates and privateers to have ever lived, 114 00:07:05,279 --> 00:07:08,640 Speaker 1: he proved himself versatile in attack and defense. He led 115 00:07:08,680 --> 00:07:12,280 Speaker 1: successful raids against the Spanish for nearly a decade in 116 00:07:12,320 --> 00:07:17,240 Speaker 1: places like Venezuela, Panama, Gibraltar, and more. He made sensible 117 00:07:17,320 --> 00:07:20,640 Speaker 1: investments into his own foothold on land and rose in 118 00:07:20,680 --> 00:07:23,000 Speaker 1: the ranks, so high, in fact, that he once found 119 00:07:23,080 --> 00:07:25,520 Speaker 1: himself as the admiral in charge of a fleet of 120 00:07:25,600 --> 00:07:29,000 Speaker 1: thirty ships. But all pirates come to an end, though 121 00:07:29,000 --> 00:07:32,840 Speaker 1: Henry's end is not the usual end of pirates and scalawags. 122 00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:36,480 Speaker 1: You see, Henry found his way into politics, landing himself 123 00:07:36,520 --> 00:07:39,760 Speaker 1: a comfortable position in his adopted home of Jamaica, where 124 00:07:39,800 --> 00:07:42,800 Speaker 1: he continued to have friendly relations with all his former 125 00:07:42,840 --> 00:07:46,920 Speaker 1: privateer friends. He served briefly as governor before his health 126 00:07:47,000 --> 00:07:51,080 Speaker 1: began to decline due to, according to his doctor, excessive drinking. 127 00:07:51,280 --> 00:07:54,120 Speaker 1: Perhaps the Rum had indeed taken a toll on Henry. 128 00:07:54,160 --> 00:07:58,520 Speaker 1: After all these years, Henry's legacy is mixed. He doesn't 129 00:07:58,560 --> 00:08:00,760 Speaker 1: stand up in the annals of his stree against the 130 00:08:00,760 --> 00:08:04,200 Speaker 1: likes of people like Blackbeard, Henry Avery, and other household 131 00:08:04,280 --> 00:08:07,160 Speaker 1: names of legend and lore. He was the muse of 132 00:08:07,200 --> 00:08:11,760 Speaker 1: the nineteen two Captain Blood novel by Raphael Sabbatini, as 133 00:08:11,760 --> 00:08:14,800 Speaker 1: well as John Steinbeck's first novel, Cup of Gold, published 134 00:08:14,800 --> 00:08:18,720 Speaker 1: in nineteen twenty nine, but after that he doesn't appear 135 00:08:18,760 --> 00:08:21,400 Speaker 1: as a prominent figure in works of fiction seeking to 136 00:08:21,480 --> 00:08:24,720 Speaker 1: glorify the Golden Age of pirates, nor is he often 137 00:08:24,760 --> 00:08:28,720 Speaker 1: included in many lists compiling the best pirates in history. 138 00:08:28,800 --> 00:08:31,480 Speaker 1: Perhaps it's because he didn't go out in that familiar 139 00:08:31,520 --> 00:08:34,920 Speaker 1: blaze of glory, or hanged for his crimes, or lost 140 00:08:34,960 --> 00:08:38,400 Speaker 1: at sea, or even a brigand to the end, Henry had, 141 00:08:38,559 --> 00:08:41,520 Speaker 1: minus the over indulgence in rum, a bit of a 142 00:08:41,600 --> 00:08:46,200 Speaker 1: quiet ending, which might well have contributed to his quiet legacy. 143 00:08:46,240 --> 00:08:48,640 Speaker 1: But there's one thing that Henry does have that makes 144 00:08:48,720 --> 00:08:51,520 Speaker 1: him stand the test of time, perhaps more than any 145 00:08:51,559 --> 00:08:54,760 Speaker 1: other pirate legend to dates, because while he did indeed 146 00:08:54,840 --> 00:08:57,839 Speaker 1: rise above captain to the rank of admiral and even 147 00:08:57,880 --> 00:09:01,720 Speaker 1: received knighthood later in life, most people today are even 148 00:09:01,760 --> 00:09:04,560 Speaker 1: aware of him because his name is on a bottle 149 00:09:04,600 --> 00:09:08,480 Speaker 1: of rum. Captain Morgan to be exact and if he 150 00:09:08,520 --> 00:09:11,640 Speaker 1: were alive to see it, I imagine Admiral Morrigan would 151 00:09:11,679 --> 00:09:14,920 Speaker 1: smile a bit and remember the good old days, back 152 00:09:14,920 --> 00:09:21,000 Speaker 1: when even he had a little captain in it. I 153 00:09:21,040 --> 00:09:24,560 Speaker 1: hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. 154 00:09:24,880 --> 00:09:28,000 Speaker 1: Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about 155 00:09:28,000 --> 00:09:32,559 Speaker 1: the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show 156 00:09:32,760 --> 00:09:36,079 Speaker 1: was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how 157 00:09:36,120 --> 00:09:39,720 Speaker 1: Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore, 158 00:09:39,960 --> 00:09:43,600 Speaker 1: which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and 159 00:09:43,640 --> 00:09:45,800 Speaker 1: you can learn all about it over at the World 160 00:09:45,880 --> 00:09:50,319 Speaker 1: of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.