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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome

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Speaker 1: to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: tuning in today. As you know we are. We are

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Speaker 1: big fans of presidential trivia, obscure presidential facts, more untold,

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Speaker 1: and dare I say, ridiculous stories throughout the history of

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Speaker 1: this fine nation of ours. I'm ben these here, United

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Speaker 1: States been the very same me being null, all things

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Speaker 1: being equal? Yes, yes, and where would we be without

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Speaker 1: our super producer, Casey Pegraham. Let's give it up for

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Speaker 1: him and long time listeners. You may recall that in

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Speaker 1: our most recent presidential episode, we explored the story of

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Speaker 1: George Washington's little known but incredibly formative adventures in Barbados.

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Speaker 1: Short time listeners, even that was only like three episodes ago.

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Speaker 1: That's true. Yeah, I wonder let us know if you're

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Speaker 1: if you actually listen to these in order, if you

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Speaker 1: just jump around and you're like, I don't know, April seventeen,

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Speaker 1: that sounds like a winner. You're really missing out if

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Speaker 1: you aren't doing in order, because there is continuity here,

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Speaker 1: my friends, they're a little easter eggs. Were building a

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Speaker 1: world here. You we're building. Yeah, the the r h

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Speaker 1: CU exactly. But if you will recall from that earlier episode,

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Speaker 1: and also, I don't remember whether our show is around

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Speaker 1: in April, of it's possible we've Yeah, this is impossible

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Speaker 1: information to find. It's just lost to the sands of time.

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Speaker 1: So casey on the case. What about that new sound cute?

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Speaker 1: It's pretty great. Uh, the other one was getting a

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Speaker 1: little too expensive. So yeah, Wolf, Dick Wolf sent us

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Speaker 1: a season desist finally. Yeah, that guys like the sugar

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Speaker 1: Knight of daytime procedural name. Dick Wolf. It's an amazing name.

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Speaker 1: Speaking of amazing names, if you tuned into our episode

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Speaker 1: on George Washington, Barbados, you'll recall that we did not uh,

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Speaker 1: we did not sally fourth into that story alone. We

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Speaker 1: were joined by a good friend of ours, friend of

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Speaker 1: the show, our research associate, Ryan Barrish, and Ryan is

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Speaker 1: here today in this episode as well. Ryan, thanks so

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Speaker 1: much for coming back, man, Yeah, thanks for having me back, guys, dude,

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Speaker 1: it's a pleasure. And I have to I have to

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Speaker 1: paint a picture here. Ryan is wearing an amazing tidye

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Speaker 1: right now that says spent a little time in the

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Speaker 1: mountain fulsome Field, Boulder, Colorado, July five and six, twenty nineteen.

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Speaker 1: Is this some sort of hippie concert? Is just a

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Speaker 1: Grateful Dead situation? Yeah? It was the um last Grateful

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Speaker 1: Dead concert or Dead and Company concert on this tour.

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Speaker 1: Oh nice? Did you go? I didn't. I was invited

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Speaker 1: to go for Andrew's batch, probably a mutual friend of ours,

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Speaker 1: Andrew whose last name was escaping me. He does shirts

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Speaker 1: for all kinds of Bandsire Weekend and and the Dead

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Speaker 1: and Company. So you said, I'm not gonna go, but

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Speaker 1: give me the shirt. I hope your marriage works out. Um. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: basically you're more of a fair weather Dead fan, right. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: What's the way they called dead heads deadheads? Yeah? Okay,

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Speaker 1: that's right, not to be confused with parrot heads, which

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Speaker 1: is fans of Jimmy Buffett or gives heads heads, the

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Speaker 1: King Giz and the Liz Wiz. Um. I actually saw.

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Speaker 1: I was in Los Angeles recently, uh, and I saw

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Speaker 1: John Mayer at a restaurant and he is devilishly handsome.

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Speaker 1: Let me tell you. I mean I would love to

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Speaker 1: look like that when I'm like forty. Apparently very problematic

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Speaker 1: character though well. Also just in defense of anybody who

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Speaker 1: has felt the same way, or like if you've ever

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Speaker 1: looked at the celebrity and thought, wow, they look great

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Speaker 1: for their age and all that stuff. In in your

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Speaker 1: defense yours, Ryan and yours, not that you need to

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Speaker 1: casey and everyone listening, keep in mind those people have

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Speaker 1: teams of folks who are paid as like a paid

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Speaker 1: a living wage to only worry about, you know, that

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Speaker 1: person's teeth or that person's skin care. They're weird, you know,

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Speaker 1: ward like do we keep it is a good pr

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Speaker 1: do we get rid of it? You know what I mean?

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Speaker 1: So there's an army behind that. And speaking of weird segues,

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Speaker 1: we so often think of enormously influential historical figures, you know,

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Speaker 1: popes and prime ministers and presidents and so on, as

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Speaker 1: these sort of standalone episodes of human history, right, But

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Speaker 1: as we saw with George Washington, and as we've seen

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Speaker 1: with every historical figure, once you dig a little deeper,

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Speaker 1: they are the results or sort of an aggregate in

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Speaker 1: many ways, of all the amazing people and experiences they

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Speaker 1: had before they became you know, the lauded individual they're

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Speaker 1: known as today, like Jimmy Carter, Jimmy Carter indeed, and

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Speaker 1: I've always easily been an interesting figure here to me

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Speaker 1: and I'm sure you as well, Ben, because he looms

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Speaker 1: large here in our fair city of Atlanta, Georgia. We

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Speaker 1: have the Carter Center, which apparently has a lovely KOI

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Speaker 1: pond behind it. I just found out. Yeah, yeah, that's true.

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Speaker 1: It looks like Casey had some experience with that. I

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Speaker 1: would take good makeout spot, Yeah, I would take. I

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Speaker 1: would take a date there, especially if I really liked

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Speaker 1: or would go out to this this neat, little kind

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Speaker 1: of hidden garden. It's got a great view of the

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Speaker 1: city if you're ever in town. And also they don't

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Speaker 1: charge you to just go there with a picnic back, right,

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Speaker 1: it's a it's a cool little jim if you ever

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Speaker 1: want to have a learning experience. And Ryan you actually

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Speaker 1: you've done some work there, right, Yeah, you know, in

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Speaker 1: addition to being the Presidential Library and COI Pond and

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Speaker 1: also a great farmers market, they have a very large

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Speaker 1: presidential archive for President Carter's work and his foundation's work,

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Speaker 1: and it actually has the archive of most of those

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Speaker 1: family members as well. I think he's almost more famous

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Speaker 1: for his you know, his foundation than he has as

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Speaker 1: doing a great job as being president, right, Yeah, he had.

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Speaker 1: His presidency was not one of the most successful ones.

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Speaker 1: It is divisive even in Georgia to talk about his

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Speaker 1: time in office. We see him as kind of a philanthropist,

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Speaker 1: someone working for human rights. Him and Rosalind Carter have

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Speaker 1: a great organization UM. And it's housed actually at the

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Speaker 1: house that General Sherman took over when he sees Atlanta, UM,

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Speaker 1: so it's a pretty prominent part of Atlanta's while you

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Speaker 1: have the great view of downtown. So that was a

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Speaker 1: complete non sequitur. But what we're going to talk about

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Speaker 1: is related to the military and kind of the reason

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Speaker 1: behind Jimmy Carter's idea or desire to join the United

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Speaker 1: States Navy. He was actually inspired by his his uncle

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Speaker 1: on his mother's side. UM, Thomas Watson Gordy not the

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Speaker 1: populist senator slash presidential candidate from Georgia, Thomas Watson, who

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Speaker 1: he was named after. I would have thought that immediately. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I'm kidding, I don't know that is you're like always

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Speaker 1: working Thomas Watson, the populist Georgist. But we're recording this

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Speaker 1: on a special day because it is Thomas Watson Gordy's

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Speaker 1: birthday today, so he would have been a hundred in

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Speaker 1: let's to the birthday math. I think it's right. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: He he was from a large family, had eight total children.

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Speaker 1: He was I said before President Jimmy Carter's mother was

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Speaker 1: one of them. But when he was married and was

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Speaker 1: starting young family, it was in the middle of the

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Speaker 1: Great Depression, so he was looking to provide for his

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Speaker 1: family during the difficult time and what he did in

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Speaker 1: order to do that was enroll in the Navy. It's

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Speaker 1: something that a lot of young men did at this

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Speaker 1: period because you couldn't really see the world. There wasn't

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Speaker 1: a lot of money, and the military ensured a comfortable living.

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Speaker 1: You know, people still do that to this day, or

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Speaker 1: at least kids I grew up with who didn't do

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Speaker 1: super well in high school and wanted to see the world,

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Speaker 1: didn't have any money to join the navy, you know,

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Speaker 1: join the military. Yeah, definitely. I think, um, the military,

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Speaker 1: if nothing else, is a good a good thing to

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Speaker 1: help you experience different cultures, to travel, and to be

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Speaker 1: stationed abroad. So this is something that entice Gordy to

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Speaker 1: do this. Um in addition to having the young children

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Speaker 1: and wife. Back home, he would send postcards to his family,

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Speaker 1: not just his immediate family, but his sister and Jimmy

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Speaker 1: Carter would read these postcards and it was something that

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Speaker 1: got him thinking about actually starting his own naval career.

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Speaker 1: At this point, I think he was in his late teens,

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Speaker 1: getting ready to graduate high school. So um, these cards

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Speaker 1: kind of arrived at a time when he was eligible

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Speaker 1: to enlist in the military. So we talked about this

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Speaker 1: a little bit off air, and one thing that I

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Speaker 1: found fascinating here was that not only have uh none

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Speaker 1: of us, including Casey, heard of Thomas Watson Gordy before,

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Speaker 1: but a lot of our listeners, even those who consider

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Speaker 1: themselves fairly uh well well read Jimmy Carter Buffs specifically,

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Speaker 1: may not know that much about Thomas Watson Gordy because

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Speaker 1: he's kind of hard to search for and you had

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Speaker 1: to do some real digging to learn about this guy. Right. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: at best you'll see Gordy's name come up, maybe in

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Speaker 1: a memoir or a biography about Jimmy Carter. In reference

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Speaker 1: to his political campaign, he used it a lot on

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Speaker 1: the campaign trail um to explain kind of as an

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Speaker 1: anecdote as as to why he joined the military, and also,

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Speaker 1: as we'll find out later, as kind of a tale

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Speaker 1: of forgiveness and um and redemptions. So he references him

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Speaker 1: almost as this like mythic figure, almost like a parable.

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Speaker 1: But there isn't a lot of information. If you do

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Speaker 1: a search on on Tom Watson Gordy, at best you

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Speaker 1: come up with sort of genealogy websites and and kind

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Speaker 1: of obituary pages. Did that about ten minutes ago, came

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Speaker 1: up with nothing. Yeah, he's um. He's not well known,

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Speaker 1: but fortunately he at least set the groundwork for him

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Speaker 1: to become well known because while he was UM, once

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Speaker 1: he had returned so spoiler, he does return, he created

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Speaker 1: a pretty detailed manuscript um telling his time. He was

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Speaker 1: also able to keep a diary while he was abroad,

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Speaker 1: and that's pretty odd, as you'll find out, because while

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Speaker 1: he was stationed abroad, it was a time where he

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Speaker 1: didn't necessarily have the most freedom. I gotta ask you, Ryan,

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Speaker 1: Um this being a sort of a deep, deep historical cut,

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Speaker 1: what was it the fascinating you about this guy that

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Speaker 1: made you kind of want to like dig in and

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Speaker 1: find out everything he could about him? One of my

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Speaker 1: hobbies is is locating someone or a piece of history

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Speaker 1: that hasn't really been explored. So I was working with

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Speaker 1: one of my professors who talked about Jimmy Carter's archives

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Speaker 1: and mentioned that there's a lot of just familiar content.

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Speaker 1: So there's there's pages and pages of of different family members,

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Speaker 1: personal belongings in this archive. So I started speaking with

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Speaker 1: the head archivists there and I just asked if you

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Speaker 1: had if you had any diaries or manuscripts or something

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Speaker 1: on kind of an auxiliary family member. And it was

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Speaker 1: fortunate that it ended up being someone that that did

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Speaker 1: play a role in Jimmy Carter's life, but also someone

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Speaker 1: who kind of has a big thruway in kind of

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Speaker 1: mid century America. His his life wasn't uncommon compared to

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Speaker 1: many veterans of the Pacific Theater, and his life was

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Speaker 1: also very parallel with just the changing time. Because something

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Speaker 1: I find so fascinating about mid century history UM is

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Speaker 1: existing during a period like the Great Depression and also

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Speaker 1: existing during the nineteen sixties. Those two periods are completely different. UM.

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Speaker 1: They're filled with despair and poverty and then excess and

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Speaker 1: kind of new budding technology. I think that's a really

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Speaker 1: in insting time to have have been alive, um, being

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Speaker 1: born before television, right, and then living to see someone

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Speaker 1: land on the Moon. There's there's a very dense amount

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Speaker 1: of progress in those in those eras. And also, I mean,

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Speaker 1: like this, this story is about to veer into some

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Speaker 1: pretty fun, ridiculous, heroic kind of territory right now too.

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Speaker 1: Like this guy, it was, on the one hand, sort

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Speaker 1: of a case study in like what a life like

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Speaker 1: this might have been. But he he got into some

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Speaker 1: interesting hijas, didn't he. Yeah, the journal that he wrote

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Speaker 1: it started just a few days before the Japanese invaded

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Speaker 1: Guam and took prisoners. So this happened the day after

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Speaker 1: Pearl Harbor, so there was almost no no knowledge, no

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Speaker 1: information had made it to Guam yet. And when Gordy

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Speaker 1: and his comrades were I guess that's communist. That's fine,

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Speaker 1: it's I think it's a word they don't own. Because

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Speaker 1: his brothers and brothers and his pals, yeah, his his

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Speaker 1: brothers in arms. They they were looking around and they

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Speaker 1: noticed the Japanese military coming on to the island from

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Speaker 1: from multiple ports of entry, and Gordy and his his

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Speaker 1: friend they were an operator of like a radio operator communications,

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Speaker 1: so they would have been the first to know, but

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Speaker 1: at this point they hadn't gotten information. There was no

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Speaker 1: expectation that they would see any military action because to

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Speaker 1: this point the Pacific theater was void of any real

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Speaker 1: Western interference. So it was basically Asian countries in Russia

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Speaker 1: kind of fighting amongst themselves. They had formed kind of

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Speaker 1: this normal life, and I think that this ability to

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Speaker 1: form a normal life in a in a foreign country

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Speaker 1: brought them a sort of comfort. They you know, they

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Speaker 1: were experiencing new people, new cultures, new drinks, um, new food.

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Speaker 1: It was a constant change that they were experiencing. But

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Speaker 1: it was a really calm experience until the day that

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Speaker 1: the Japanese came on to the island and started taking

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Speaker 1: the prisoners. December, correct, Yeah, and um, right before that,

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Speaker 1: I think a day or two before the the capture

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Speaker 1: takes place. Gordy rights in his diary that his one

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Speaker 1: regret was that he didn't mail the money order in

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Speaker 1: time for the holidays. He was looking to buy a

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Speaker 1: bicycle for his his youngest son and had not sent

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Speaker 1: the money in order for his wife to buy it

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Speaker 1: in time for Christmas Day, So you can see how

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Speaker 1: he had kind of developed this routine of normalcy on

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Speaker 1: the island. It was almost like having a job in

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Speaker 1: a in a different city. But um ironically, the first

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Speaker 1: time that he encountered the Japanese, what he noticed was

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Speaker 1: his bicycle was outside the house, and the Japanese were

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Speaker 1: looking at it. And that's what hinted them that somebody

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Speaker 1: was still stationed there. Right Because as you had established

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Speaker 1: before when you were when you were doing the research here,

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Speaker 1: the Japanese, these forces found a surreal Twilight Zone esque situation.

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Speaker 1: They were searching for Americans that survived earlier bombings, and

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Speaker 1: when they came to the area, the camp was a

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Speaker 1: ghost town, right, like everything except for with those little

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Speaker 1: dust devils that blew across main street. Yes, yeah, they're everything,

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Speaker 1: but the tumbleweeds. This this is a spooky situation. But

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Speaker 1: they're walking by these residencies, these dorms essentially, and they

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Speaker 1: see this pretty well maintained bicycle and what happens now,

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Speaker 1: So one of the Japanese soldiers actually steals the bike

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Speaker 1: and rides away on it. At this point, I think

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Speaker 1: that Gordy realizes he cannot escape the Japanese. He now

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Speaker 1: has lost his only mode of transportation, and at best

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Speaker 1: of bicycle against whatever soldiers might have with would hardly

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Speaker 1: stand a chance. So he convinced his housemate to surrender peacefully.

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Speaker 1: He explained to his housemaid that it would be better

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Speaker 1: for us to take a chance and turn in. They

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Speaker 1: weren't combative soldiers, so they weren't necessarily equipped to the

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Speaker 1: stage any sort of large, large coup or anything like that. Well,

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Speaker 1: I guess not cool resistance, and so as the as

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Speaker 1: the Japanese came by, they surrendered by walking out of

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Speaker 1: the house with their hands raised. Gordon's main priority at

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Speaker 1: this time, though, was to sneak cigarettes and his diary

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Speaker 1: with him, so those were things that he hid and

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Speaker 1: in his friend's socks. He hid the cigarettes, he had

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Speaker 1: the diary in his clothes, and they walked out. Um

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Speaker 1: They were driven to a plaza which which housed the hospital,

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Speaker 1: where they were asked to remove their shirts and searched. Somehow,

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Speaker 1: they didn't find the cigarettes or the diary in the

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Speaker 1: socks or the or the pants, but they were basically,

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Speaker 1: you know, left without anything any person belonging short of

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Speaker 1: those two and the the po ws in the Japanese

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Speaker 1: situation this time did not enjoy much in the ways

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Speaker 1: of like international conventions like Geneva conventions, things like treatment

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Speaker 1: of the captured in wartime. And as a matter of fact,

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Speaker 1: these guys are the very bottom of the social hierarchy, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: They Japanese customs typically don't involve taking prisoners. So in

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Speaker 1: their military code, you want to fight until your last breath,

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Speaker 1: and um, you never want to think about surrendering to

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Speaker 1: the enemy. It's almost a perplexing thought to surrender. In Japan,

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Speaker 1: they are taught to fight until until they passed away.

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Speaker 1: So I mean they're if they're even shamed in any

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Speaker 1: I mean, like at least in the old you know,

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Speaker 1: feudal feudal Japan days, in the samurai, I mean, they

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Speaker 1: would commit ritual suicide in front of everybody if they

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Speaker 1: were defeated in some way or like, you know, to

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Speaker 1: shame their family. I mean, that was absolutely part of

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Speaker 1: their culture. It makes sense, yeah, and we see it

299
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Speaker 1: even later with things like kamakaze pilots. So it's relatively

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Speaker 1: odd to have kind of accept a peaceful surrender and

301
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Speaker 1: accept prisoners, because if you are fighting a war, it's

302
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Speaker 1: also just another thing to consider, how are we going

303
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Speaker 1: to take care of them? How are they going to

304
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Speaker 1: house them? So what we see is Gordy and his

305
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Speaker 1: fellow captured UM prisoners. They are taken to a hospital

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Speaker 1: in Guam. Hospital can kind of act as a as

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Speaker 1: a makeshift prison based on the way it's set up,

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Speaker 1: but there there isn't really an infrastructure set up to

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Speaker 1: take care of these prisoners. We see a lot of abuse.

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Speaker 1: Gordy describes an instance of being punched with a belt

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Speaker 1: buckle while brushing his teeth. Um, he doesn't really it

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Speaker 1: makes me cringe. Yeah, it's probably on the bottom of

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Speaker 1: list of things to any any teeth things, there are

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Speaker 1: always a real red flag for me. Um. Yeah. And

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Speaker 1: there was all kinds of other mistreatment that he witnessed

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Speaker 1: as well. Yeah. I mean the hospitals did have nice rooms,

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Speaker 1: but they removed all the beds. So that's just one

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Speaker 1: aspect of this kind of prison environment that the Japanese

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Speaker 1: we're looking to create. They stayed in this hospit battle

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Speaker 1: for about two days before they moved to a Catholic

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Speaker 1: church where food was even more limited. So they had

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Speaker 1: been receiving two meals of ping pong sized potatoes and

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Speaker 1: a slice of bologna. Less than a month later, Gordy

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Speaker 1: had written that they were they were boarding a ship

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Speaker 1: and this kind of signaled the end of freedom for him. Uh,

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Speaker 1: he was leaving the country that he started to feel

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Speaker 1: at home in over the past few years, and now

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Speaker 1: he's headed to a foreign country for an uncertain amount

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Speaker 1: of time. Out of the frying pan, into the fire,

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Speaker 1: or perhaps we should say out of the frying pan,

331
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Speaker 1: onto the hibachi. Right, they take these po ws to Japan,

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Speaker 1: where things get worse and worse. And this this is

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Speaker 1: interesting because I was looking through some of your research

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Speaker 1: on this, right, and I noticed, like you said at

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Speaker 1: the top of the show, in his diary he list

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Speaker 1: he keep track of things like his income, and he

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00:20:02,240 --> 00:20:07,119
Speaker 1: continues to do this in the Japanese prison. But we're

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00:20:07,160 --> 00:20:09,919
Speaker 1: still I don't know. We have some speculation on what

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00:20:09,960 --> 00:20:11,880
Speaker 1: he was doing. Most a lot of people in prison

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Speaker 1: don't have a job like that. Yeah, it is odd

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Speaker 1: that he was able to notate we still receiving income,

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Speaker 1: and um, it appeared that he was able to work

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Speaker 1: for different people, maybe doing odd jobs and bonus jobs

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Speaker 1: within the prison. The conditions in Japan were as you

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Speaker 1: can expect, poor. They didn't have prison set up. They're

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00:20:33,080 --> 00:20:36,520
Speaker 1: only source of heat was actually a small habachi made

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Speaker 1: of ceramics that he wasn't really able to keep the

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Speaker 1: prisoners warm. It kind of just turned into a cause

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Speaker 1: of of actual physical headaches from all the carbon monoxide

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Speaker 1: that was coming from the habbachi's There's also sanitation issues, um,

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00:20:54,400 --> 00:20:56,840
Speaker 1: things like a long slit cut in the floor that

352
00:20:56,960 --> 00:21:00,800
Speaker 1: was just the toilet. But despite the livings, he does

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Speaker 1: note that that he is being paid. He doesn't state

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Speaker 1: where it comes from, but based on based on reading

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Speaker 1: that um, that journal that he wrote, and also I

356
00:21:11,400 --> 00:21:13,240
Speaker 1: was able to find some books of people who were

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Speaker 1: actually captured in Guam at the same time as him,

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Speaker 1: and they note that they were able to work small

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00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:22,200
Speaker 1: jobs or work extra hours, um, whether it was farming

360
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Speaker 1: or manufacturing, to earn a little bit of extra money.

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Speaker 1: So I would assume his his situation is the same.

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Speaker 1: But he does talk about creating a sort of a

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Speaker 1: barter system by stockpiling cigarettes and later selling or trading them.

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Speaker 1: That also is likely a source of income that he

365
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Speaker 1: had by um, you know, kind of hoarding cigarettes as

366
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Speaker 1: he had them and using them as a kind of

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00:21:44,040 --> 00:21:47,280
Speaker 1: a leverage tool later on that allowed him to gain

368
00:21:47,320 --> 00:21:49,960
Speaker 1: a little bit of power kind of in the in

369
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Speaker 1: the prison socio economic life. He was able to swap

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Speaker 1: and buy things in secret. And it was also, like

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Speaker 1: I said, possible, he's being paid on his table, like, um,

372
00:21:59,200 --> 00:22:02,240
Speaker 1: he could he cook for Japanese officers who didn't feel

373
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Speaker 1: like cooking for themselves. That seemed to be a job

374
00:22:05,600 --> 00:22:07,760
Speaker 1: that some prisoners were able to do to earn some

375
00:22:07,840 --> 00:22:10,479
Speaker 1: money kind of in secret. Now at this time, he

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Speaker 1: was still allowed to send and receive mail. Is that correct?

377
00:22:14,359 --> 00:22:17,680
Speaker 1: I don't believe so, okay, because I know he would

378
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Speaker 1: write letters sort of as addressed to his family, but

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00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:25,359
Speaker 1: they weren't actually going anywhere, right, Yeah, he had. He'd

380
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Speaker 1: write in his journal little letters that never were removed

381
00:22:29,040 --> 00:22:30,600
Speaker 1: from his journal. They were just kind of kept in

382
00:22:30,680 --> 00:22:33,320
Speaker 1: there um as a way to feel like he was

383
00:22:33,320 --> 00:22:37,679
Speaker 1: communicating possibly. And what is odd around this time, his

384
00:22:37,720 --> 00:22:41,879
Speaker 1: family was actually notified that that he was likely dead

385
00:22:41,960 --> 00:22:46,680
Speaker 1: by the Red Cross. So with that absence and communication

386
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Speaker 1: from him and that notification, his family back home was

387
00:22:51,000 --> 00:22:54,160
Speaker 1: starting to well most likely feared the worst. They were

388
00:22:55,119 --> 00:22:57,480
Speaker 1: presuming him dead. And we're looking at, you know, moving

389
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Speaker 1: on with with their life, which is pretty difficult. While

390
00:23:00,560 --> 00:23:04,119
Speaker 1: Gordy was still kind of doing the repetitive days in

391
00:23:04,160 --> 00:23:08,160
Speaker 1: the prison, which started to mess with him physically and mentally.

392
00:23:08,640 --> 00:23:10,520
Speaker 1: He was eating the same thing every day, he was

393
00:23:10,560 --> 00:23:13,960
Speaker 1: working on farms and in steel factories. He didn't know

394
00:23:14,000 --> 00:23:15,840
Speaker 1: when it would end, if it would end, if he

395
00:23:15,880 --> 00:23:18,119
Speaker 1: would live to see it end. And I think that

396
00:23:18,280 --> 00:23:22,560
Speaker 1: lack of hope was kind of making it difficult for him,

397
00:23:22,720 --> 00:23:26,240
Speaker 1: especially around Christmas, which again if you remember at the

398
00:23:26,240 --> 00:23:28,879
Speaker 1: top of the podcast, we talked about him trying or

399
00:23:28,920 --> 00:23:31,280
Speaker 1: forgetting to send a money order to his wife for

400
00:23:31,320 --> 00:23:35,000
Speaker 1: a bicycle. Well, this Christmas marked about a year since

401
00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:38,679
Speaker 1: he'd been held captive, and he was he missed writing

402
00:23:38,800 --> 00:23:42,639
Speaker 1: letters to his family, but he uh in his notebook

403
00:23:42,680 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 1: he would write and there about how guilty he felt

404
00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:48,520
Speaker 1: about missing the important events. If you look in the calendar,

405
00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:52,480
Speaker 1: and we'll post some images of of his calendar, he'll

406
00:23:52,520 --> 00:23:55,879
Speaker 1: notate all the birthdays he misses, and it's it's really

407
00:23:55,880 --> 00:23:58,440
Speaker 1: sad to see. He also notates medical issues. He has

408
00:23:58,720 --> 00:24:01,800
Speaker 1: um teeth, he law, all sort of sorts of interesting

409
00:24:01,840 --> 00:24:05,440
Speaker 1: things on there. One interesting thing that he did keep

410
00:24:05,520 --> 00:24:09,680
Speaker 1: in his calendar. Was he would not take me shaved

411
00:24:09,760 --> 00:24:12,840
Speaker 1: his his beard, and at for a while he actually

412
00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:15,560
Speaker 1: had a beard growth count that he was he was

413
00:24:15,600 --> 00:24:17,919
Speaker 1: working on. Growing out of beard became a little bit

414
00:24:17,920 --> 00:24:20,800
Speaker 1: of a distraction for him, and whenever he was asked

415
00:24:20,840 --> 00:24:23,159
Speaker 1: to shave his beard, he would typically write about it

416
00:24:23,160 --> 00:24:26,479
Speaker 1: in his journal and express some some frustration that they

417
00:24:26,480 --> 00:24:29,360
Speaker 1: were trying to take away one thing that he can control.

418
00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:32,800
Speaker 1: So he was trying to create some sort of rhythm

419
00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:35,600
Speaker 1: and meaning for himself and his life and through writing

420
00:24:35,600 --> 00:24:38,680
Speaker 1: in this journal and keeping a calendar, but the days

421
00:24:38,680 --> 00:24:42,760
Speaker 1: were still strenuous, um and you know, the diary provided

422
00:24:42,800 --> 00:24:45,199
Speaker 1: some relief, but it really it was kind of a

423
00:24:45,240 --> 00:24:47,760
Speaker 1: small thing in the in the grand scheme of things.

424
00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:52,680
Speaker 1: Of course, he also wrote about revenge fantasies, right, and

425
00:24:53,320 --> 00:24:59,359
Speaker 1: hopes for hopes for retribution. Yeah, if you recall when

426
00:24:59,560 --> 00:25:03,480
Speaker 1: he was captured, he convinced his housemate to go peacefully,

427
00:25:03,520 --> 00:25:08,240
Speaker 1: so he really didn't have a violent streak or an

428
00:25:08,240 --> 00:25:12,600
Speaker 1: aggressive streak it it appeared before being captured. But towards

429
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:16,040
Speaker 1: the end of his journal, you start to see things

430
00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:20,520
Speaker 1: like him saying that he would like to watch them

431
00:25:20,560 --> 00:25:23,640
Speaker 1: die or be the one that kills them. He starts

432
00:25:23,680 --> 00:25:28,840
Speaker 1: to talk about about in in pretty physical Lee grew

433
00:25:28,880 --> 00:25:33,160
Speaker 1: someome detail or very specific detail about how he would

434
00:25:33,200 --> 00:25:34,960
Speaker 1: like to harm them. Yeah, I mean I can relate

435
00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:37,000
Speaker 1: to that. Sure, that's long. How long was he in

436
00:25:37,080 --> 00:25:40,960
Speaker 1: prison total at this point? It was at this point

437
00:25:41,040 --> 00:25:43,320
Speaker 1: when he starts writing it about it, it's about a year.

438
00:25:44,359 --> 00:25:47,320
Speaker 1: That's enough. I don't know I'd make it that long

439
00:25:47,400 --> 00:25:51,080
Speaker 1: without thinking some pretty pretty uh impure thoughts about what

440
00:25:51,119 --> 00:25:52,359
Speaker 1: I want to do to the folks that were like

441
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 1: torturing me and making me sleep on the floor and

442
00:25:55,320 --> 00:25:57,440
Speaker 1: you know, all of this stuff. It just seems very

443
00:25:57,560 --> 00:26:00,919
Speaker 1: very very awful. Thank you years more than enough, you

444
00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:03,960
Speaker 1: know what I mean. And if I'm sure we have

445
00:26:04,080 --> 00:26:07,880
Speaker 1: people listening now who have kept journals and diaries who

446
00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:12,440
Speaker 1: are not in uh military prison situation, right, and they

447
00:26:12,480 --> 00:26:18,760
Speaker 1: probably already have some some pretty heartfelt, uh graphic angry

448
00:26:18,800 --> 00:26:22,720
Speaker 1: things in their own life experience during peacetime. It was

449
00:26:22,800 --> 00:26:26,840
Speaker 1: interesting to me Ryan the story of Miyasaki, who was

450
00:26:26,880 --> 00:26:30,640
Speaker 1: like one of the big bads for Gordy at least. Yeah, Miyasaki,

451
00:26:30,720 --> 00:26:34,000
Speaker 1: who was actually the person who punched Gordy with the

452
00:26:34,080 --> 00:26:38,160
Speaker 1: belt buckle, earlier, while brushing his teeth, he is uh.

453
00:26:38,200 --> 00:26:40,919
Speaker 1: He's brought up a couple of times throughout this journal.

454
00:26:41,040 --> 00:26:43,359
Speaker 1: One time he writes that I hope he gets killed

455
00:26:43,359 --> 00:26:45,840
Speaker 1: in the first air rate here, and I hope that

456
00:26:45,920 --> 00:26:48,680
Speaker 1: I will be here to see it. So that kind

457
00:26:48,680 --> 00:26:50,680
Speaker 1: of gives you an example of he not only wants

458
00:26:50,840 --> 00:26:53,240
Speaker 1: wishes death upon him, but he also would like to

459
00:26:53,240 --> 00:26:56,199
Speaker 1: witness it, which is I think, to me, the the

460
00:26:56,320 --> 00:27:02,040
Speaker 1: ultimate uh disdain for somebody. And what's really interesting is

461
00:27:02,119 --> 00:27:05,200
Speaker 1: that Donald Giles, who's the author of Captive of a

462
00:27:05,359 --> 00:27:08,320
Speaker 1: Rising Sun, which is his memoir um that he wrote

463
00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:12,399
Speaker 1: while being captured with Gordy, he doesn't mention Gordy specifically

464
00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:14,720
Speaker 1: in a book, but it's really interesting because they mentioned

465
00:27:14,760 --> 00:27:17,240
Speaker 1: a lot of the same characters. So while they may

466
00:27:17,240 --> 00:27:20,560
Speaker 1: not have been necessarily close enough to write about each other,

467
00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:24,760
Speaker 1: they were having a shared experience within this prison. Again,

468
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:29,119
Speaker 1: like we said, he was really noncombative. He was, he

469
00:27:29,200 --> 00:27:32,520
Speaker 1: was willfully surrendering to them. Now he's moved towards wishing

470
00:27:32,600 --> 00:27:36,159
Speaker 1: death upon Japanese guards. Yeah, this is weird too because

471
00:27:36,160 --> 00:27:39,920
Speaker 1: we can kind of see this inner world that has

472
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:44,240
Speaker 1: been constructed, right because whenever people are isolated from the

473
00:27:44,320 --> 00:27:49,359
Speaker 1: larger world. We sort of conform to the size of

474
00:27:49,400 --> 00:27:52,080
Speaker 1: our container, right in every sense of the words. So

475
00:27:52,440 --> 00:27:55,159
Speaker 1: he's monitoring things as closely as he can so he

476
00:27:55,200 --> 00:27:58,040
Speaker 1: doesn't get lost in the sameness and the routine. And

477
00:27:58,080 --> 00:28:02,160
Speaker 1: one thing it's fascinating here is, like many people who

478
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:08,960
Speaker 1: are imprisoned, he is trying ardently to learn any news

479
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:13,560
Speaker 1: of the larger world, right, and he figures out some

480
00:28:13,640 --> 00:28:16,120
Speaker 1: ways to do this. But it's not as simple as

481
00:28:16,119 --> 00:28:18,760
Speaker 1: you know, hopping on a phone or hopping on a computer,

482
00:28:19,600 --> 00:28:23,080
Speaker 1: reading a newspaper. Even he has to kind of guess

483
00:28:23,200 --> 00:28:27,240
Speaker 1: based on the changing behavior of what the guards, the authorities. Yeah,

484
00:28:27,280 --> 00:28:31,000
Speaker 1: he would often assume that the way that he's being treated,

485
00:28:31,160 --> 00:28:34,639
Speaker 1: if he's being treated positively, it meant that it's possible

486
00:28:34,800 --> 00:28:38,560
Speaker 1: that the Americans were winning, that the Japanese keeping him

487
00:28:38,600 --> 00:28:41,560
Speaker 1: captive might be coming to an end, And as he's

488
00:28:41,600 --> 00:28:44,560
Speaker 1: being treated worse, he would assume the opposite, so that

489
00:28:44,560 --> 00:28:48,200
Speaker 1: the Japanese were winning the Pacific theater kind of towards

490
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:52,440
Speaker 1: the end, close to his release, he actually writes that

491
00:28:52,720 --> 00:28:54,600
Speaker 1: he says, my god, we must be winning the war.

492
00:28:55,120 --> 00:28:58,360
Speaker 1: Because there was one day where he went to a

493
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 1: concert that they held there. He had free cigarettes and

494
00:29:01,280 --> 00:29:05,560
Speaker 1: a large meal, which was definitely not the common situation

495
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:08,320
Speaker 1: for him in the prison. Let's cut back to the

496
00:29:08,360 --> 00:29:10,680
Speaker 1: good old us of a let's go across the pond.

497
00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:16,800
Speaker 1: I believe earlier you said that, uh, many of Gordon's

498
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:20,600
Speaker 1: relatives were convinced that he was dead and that was

499
00:29:20,640 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 1: based off the uh, the estimation of the Red Cross. Right. Yeah,

500
00:29:25,480 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: so they were unable to verify whether he was taken,

501
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:32,840
Speaker 1: captive or killed in a previous bombing raid, so that

502
00:29:32,920 --> 00:29:35,719
Speaker 1: he was assumed dead by the Red Cross. This had

503
00:29:35,760 --> 00:29:39,640
Speaker 1: an impact on multiple members of his family. Jimmy Carter,

504
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:43,440
Speaker 1: it kind of was the final nail in the coffin,

505
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:47,120
Speaker 1: I guess, or the final thing that made him decide

506
00:29:47,160 --> 00:29:50,920
Speaker 1: to enlisten the Navy because he wanted to honor his

507
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:53,760
Speaker 1: uncle who had paid the ultimate sacrifice during his time

508
00:29:53,800 --> 00:29:56,080
Speaker 1: in the military, or so he believed at the time.

509
00:29:56,840 --> 00:29:59,200
Speaker 1: World War two is still going strong. So at seventeen

510
00:29:59,320 --> 00:30:03,520
Speaker 1: he had listed um which was definitely a major life

511
00:30:03,560 --> 00:30:07,040
Speaker 1: change and is something the sailor identity is is actually

512
00:30:07,080 --> 00:30:09,840
Speaker 1: something that was really important to Jimmy Carter in the

513
00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:12,360
Speaker 1: early part of his life as far as the rest

514
00:30:12,400 --> 00:30:15,600
Speaker 1: of his family goes. His wife getting the news that

515
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 1: her husband had died with her two young children. She

516
00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:22,959
Speaker 1: was living in San Francisco, across the country from family

517
00:30:23,040 --> 00:30:26,360
Speaker 1: that can help, so she moved back to Rule Georgia

518
00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:29,000
Speaker 1: to be close to Tom's family and the Carters as well.

519
00:30:29,680 --> 00:30:31,880
Speaker 1: She was living there for a little while until she

520
00:30:31,960 --> 00:30:35,520
Speaker 1: found out that he was confirmed or supposedly confirmed dead.

521
00:30:35,680 --> 00:30:38,160
Speaker 1: So from the time he left the time he found out,

522
00:30:38,200 --> 00:30:40,160
Speaker 1: she was spending the time in Georgia. But once she

523
00:30:40,200 --> 00:30:42,920
Speaker 1: found out he was dead, she decided to move back

524
00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:45,400
Speaker 1: to San Francisco and try to continue her life there

525
00:30:45,880 --> 00:30:51,560
Speaker 1: where she actually got remarried um and started a new life. Now,

526
00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:55,200
Speaker 1: as you guys know, he does return home, so this,

527
00:30:55,200 --> 00:30:59,520
Speaker 1: this remarriage kind of sets up an awkward situation. So

528
00:31:01,200 --> 00:31:03,360
Speaker 1: upon his return, he weighed less than a hundred pounds,

529
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:06,920
Speaker 1: so obviously it had taken a toll on him. Dorothy.

530
00:31:06,920 --> 00:31:09,000
Speaker 1: When she found out he came home, she offered to

531
00:31:09,040 --> 00:31:12,479
Speaker 1: annul her current marriage, which is I don't know, how

532
00:31:12,480 --> 00:31:15,400
Speaker 1: do you guys feel about that. I feel like it's

533
00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:19,920
Speaker 1: a nice thought, yeah, but that's that some things can't

534
00:31:19,920 --> 00:31:22,360
Speaker 1: be mended. It's a little, too little, too late in

535
00:31:22,440 --> 00:31:25,240
Speaker 1: a situation I think, right, Yeah, it feels like maybe

536
00:31:25,280 --> 00:31:27,680
Speaker 1: she was doing what she thought was the right thing

537
00:31:27,720 --> 00:31:30,800
Speaker 1: to do. Yeah, many in the in the Carter family,

538
00:31:31,480 --> 00:31:33,920
Speaker 1: I thought she got married too soon. It was kind

539
00:31:33,960 --> 00:31:38,400
Speaker 1: of a common thing that they they blame his his

540
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:42,120
Speaker 1: first wife, Dorothy with with contributing to his mental anguish

541
00:31:42,320 --> 00:31:45,360
Speaker 1: and depression that he experienced in the rest of his life.

542
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:49,320
Speaker 1: While Jimmy Carter actually spoke about this on the campaign

543
00:31:49,360 --> 00:31:52,520
Speaker 1: trail is something that is way more nuanced than just

544
00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:56,600
Speaker 1: being remarried, because if you assume that your husband's dead,

545
00:31:57,640 --> 00:32:01,400
Speaker 1: especially after a couple of years of UM of him

546
00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:06,000
Speaker 1: being detained, you're going to assume that you, well, you're

547
00:32:06,040 --> 00:32:08,120
Speaker 1: going to want to continue your life. You're going to

548
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 1: want to find some sense of normalcy, whether that's a husband,

549
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 1: a new job, steady place to live. UM, there's going

550
00:32:16,280 --> 00:32:19,320
Speaker 1: to usually be changed involved in that. And I'm sure

551
00:32:19,440 --> 00:32:23,360
Speaker 1: she wasn't expecting her husband to reappear. So I do

552
00:32:23,440 --> 00:32:25,520
Speaker 1: think it was a sweet gesture, but it is one

553
00:32:25,520 --> 00:32:28,520
Speaker 1: of those I don't think there is a winning situation

554
00:32:28,640 --> 00:32:32,680
Speaker 1: in any of it, um, because someone's going to be

555
00:32:32,880 --> 00:32:36,480
Speaker 1: terribly bothered by by a decision that's made, and unfortunately

556
00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:40,000
Speaker 1: Dorothy was put in kind of that impossible situation. Yeah,

557
00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:41,760
Speaker 1: it's sort of a rock and a hard place, as

558
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:44,880
Speaker 1: you said, Kobyashi Maru for the Star Trek fans out there,

559
00:32:45,440 --> 00:32:48,360
Speaker 1: Thomas Watson, Gordy, I have to say, I think you

560
00:32:48,440 --> 00:32:52,000
Speaker 1: made the right decision by saying no, don't don't anno

561
00:32:52,120 --> 00:32:55,240
Speaker 1: your marriage, just because you feel like it's the right

562
00:32:55,280 --> 00:32:57,239
Speaker 1: thing to do, do what you truly want to do.

563
00:32:57,880 --> 00:33:01,600
Speaker 1: And he lived out the rest of his life in

564
00:33:01,640 --> 00:33:08,080
Speaker 1: the US. He passed away in nineteen seventy five, and

565
00:33:08,280 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 1: by the time he had passed away, Jimmy Carter's career

566
00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:16,640
Speaker 1: was already in like he had seen the career begin

567
00:33:16,880 --> 00:33:19,680
Speaker 1: from the Navy days so on. And and I think

568
00:33:19,680 --> 00:33:22,560
Speaker 1: it's safe to say that for a long time, Jimmy

569
00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:29,240
Speaker 1: Carter considered Gordy to be like one of his personal heroes, right. Yeah.

570
00:33:29,360 --> 00:33:31,920
Speaker 1: He looked at Gordy as someone who was willing to

571
00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:35,520
Speaker 1: take take chances and to change his life and to

572
00:33:35,560 --> 00:33:37,800
Speaker 1: stand up for what he believed in. And that's something

573
00:33:37,840 --> 00:33:39,960
Speaker 1: that Carter carried with him, whether it was joining the

574
00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:44,920
Speaker 1: Navy at seventeen, running for governor, being involved in politics

575
00:33:44,920 --> 00:33:48,640
Speaker 1: in general. Carter was someone who wanted to provide for

576
00:33:48,680 --> 00:33:52,840
Speaker 1: his family by carving his own lane in life, rather

577
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:55,680
Speaker 1: than relying on his family's peanut farm, which he does

578
00:33:55,720 --> 00:33:57,920
Speaker 1: go and help with in the future, but not before

579
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:02,760
Speaker 1: he's created his own identity. So he's someone who, even

580
00:34:02,760 --> 00:34:05,400
Speaker 1: at a young age, was looking to eclipse the shadows

581
00:34:05,440 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 1: of his parents, which is a pretty good trait to

582
00:34:08,600 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 1: having is something he picked up from his uncle, who

583
00:34:12,520 --> 00:34:14,160
Speaker 1: u there is a little bit of a happy ending.

584
00:34:14,280 --> 00:34:17,480
Speaker 1: He does remarry at some point in the in the

585
00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:20,720
Speaker 1: final thirty years, and so he does have a partner,

586
00:34:20,840 --> 00:34:24,640
Speaker 1: and she was actually pivotal in encouraging him to write

587
00:34:24,640 --> 00:34:28,200
Speaker 1: the manuscript to try to process the feelings because he

588
00:34:28,280 --> 00:34:31,759
Speaker 1: did become sort of a racial curmudgeon in a in

589
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:34,279
Speaker 1: a way racist curmudgeon. Towards the end of his life.

590
00:34:34,320 --> 00:34:38,840
Speaker 1: He he really couldn't bring him around people of color,

591
00:34:39,080 --> 00:34:45,920
Speaker 1: particularly Asians, because he would trigger this this PTSD type feeling,

592
00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:48,000
Speaker 1: which reminds me of like Cotton Hill from King of

593
00:34:48,000 --> 00:34:51,320
Speaker 1: the Hill, where he would just have these like fire flashbacks. Apparently.

594
00:34:56,560 --> 00:35:00,319
Speaker 1: It's worth noting though, that while his life was to cold,

595
00:35:00,360 --> 00:35:02,800
Speaker 1: he did get to live. You know, a long life.

596
00:35:02,840 --> 00:35:06,319
Speaker 1: He did get to come back to America, which he

597
00:35:06,400 --> 00:35:10,320
Speaker 1: was seeing rapidly had changed. I can't imagine what it

598
00:35:10,360 --> 00:35:13,920
Speaker 1: would be like to leave during the Great Depression and

599
00:35:14,040 --> 00:35:18,080
Speaker 1: return once the economic boom had had kind of turned

600
00:35:18,480 --> 00:35:21,719
Speaker 1: America around, you know, very different world. When he left.

601
00:35:21,800 --> 00:35:25,439
Speaker 1: Model t s were like the only car and uh,

602
00:35:25,480 --> 00:35:28,120
Speaker 1: you know, mid forties were starting to see real real

603
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:32,680
Speaker 1: car models were starting to see, uh, modern cities really

604
00:35:32,680 --> 00:35:36,960
Speaker 1: grow and boom. And part of that boom was was

605
00:35:37,000 --> 00:35:39,840
Speaker 1: the tiki bar boom. One of my favorite things in

606
00:35:39,880 --> 00:35:42,279
Speaker 1: the whole world. So now we're going to we're indy

607
00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:45,160
Speaker 1: out a more positive note. Let's let's bring it, let's

608
00:35:45,160 --> 00:35:48,760
Speaker 1: bring it back around. And something that many people brought

609
00:35:49,080 --> 00:35:52,520
Speaker 1: from the Pacific was that memory of of a tropical

610
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:57,000
Speaker 1: drink um kind of a a shady, dark place which

611
00:35:57,000 --> 00:35:59,440
Speaker 1: they would use to escape the heat, and it was

612
00:35:59,480 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 1: somewhere where they can kind of just hide away from

613
00:36:02,719 --> 00:36:05,719
Speaker 1: from the day to day life. Sometimes it's from the

614
00:36:05,760 --> 00:36:08,800
Speaker 1: frenzies of war. Sometimes it's just a way to pass

615
00:36:08,840 --> 00:36:13,880
Speaker 1: the time. But as soldiers returned, they returned kind of

616
00:36:13,920 --> 00:36:16,920
Speaker 1: with this trend started by Don Beach, who opened on

617
00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:21,360
Speaker 1: the Beach Comber in Hollywood, California. Four real name Ernest

618
00:36:21,440 --> 00:36:24,040
Speaker 1: Raymond Bouma gons right, And I want to say, Ben,

619
00:36:24,120 --> 00:36:27,800
Speaker 1: you and I went to a pretty old school Hollywood

620
00:36:27,840 --> 00:36:31,480
Speaker 1: tiki bar. The other ones called tiki t Dicky Tie,

621
00:36:31,680 --> 00:36:34,400
Speaker 1: and I believe that Beach Comber recipe for the my

622
00:36:34,600 --> 00:36:36,719
Speaker 1: taie is like a big deal. It's like considered like

623
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:39,400
Speaker 1: the holy grail of like my tai recipes. Is a

624
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:41,439
Speaker 1: friend of ours. You've got to meet Ryan. His name

625
00:36:41,520 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb. He's a co host of a couple

626
00:36:44,160 --> 00:36:46,759
Speaker 1: of different shows here, stuff to blow your mind and invention.

627
00:36:47,000 --> 00:36:50,840
Speaker 1: It's also a huge tiki fanatic. So whenever on the

628
00:36:50,960 --> 00:36:53,399
Speaker 1: road with him, Actually, you know what, if you ever

629
00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 1: just meet him and run into him, ask him about

630
00:36:55,640 --> 00:36:58,720
Speaker 1: some tiki places, make sure you have like thirty minutes

631
00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:02,120
Speaker 1: and makes you're ready to drive somewhere with them or fly.

632
00:37:02,760 --> 00:37:04,839
Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken. This story is gonna end up at

633
00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:07,200
Speaker 1: one of my favorite places in all of Atlanta, Georgia.

634
00:37:07,960 --> 00:37:12,200
Speaker 1: Trader Vix. Yeah, Trader Vix was kind of the second

635
00:37:12,600 --> 00:37:16,800
Speaker 1: tiki bar to really established itself an American culture. Trader

636
00:37:16,920 --> 00:37:20,000
Speaker 1: Vix incorporated food as well as the ma Taie and

637
00:37:20,040 --> 00:37:23,520
Speaker 1: the other drinks they brought over the famous poop Poop

638
00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:28,120
Speaker 1: latter sorry I cannot And Trader vix Is is kind

639
00:37:28,120 --> 00:37:32,000
Speaker 1: of the the legacy of this this old guard of

640
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:35,319
Speaker 1: of tiki bars. It's the one that, as Noel said,

641
00:37:35,360 --> 00:37:38,480
Speaker 1: we still have here in Atlanta. It's a great establishment.

642
00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:41,719
Speaker 1: It's really exciting during Dragon Conics. I was there this

643
00:37:41,800 --> 00:37:44,200
Speaker 1: time around. It so much fun. Yeah, it's it's a

644
00:37:44,280 --> 00:37:46,799
Speaker 1: it's a place to be got a live band, which

645
00:37:46,800 --> 00:37:49,960
Speaker 1: I always love. Yeah, yeah, and um, you know, we're

646
00:37:49,960 --> 00:37:52,960
Speaker 1: seeing these resurgeons here in Atlanta. But there was a

647
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:55,799
Speaker 1: period of time kind of sixties through the nineties when

648
00:37:56,840 --> 00:38:00,600
Speaker 1: tiki bars were considered not in vogue. Um, so you

649
00:38:00,640 --> 00:38:04,279
Speaker 1: started seeing a lot of them clothes. Fortunately, as we know,

650
00:38:04,360 --> 00:38:06,960
Speaker 1: they've made a comeback and we we see them, particularly

651
00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:11,319
Speaker 1: around two thousand fifteen, two thousand sixteen, we see a

652
00:38:11,400 --> 00:38:14,040
Speaker 1: new desire to escape. And it's so lucky that some

653
00:38:14,080 --> 00:38:16,319
Speaker 1: of the historical ones are still around, you know, like

654
00:38:16,360 --> 00:38:18,919
Speaker 1: Traitor vis As pretty much as it's always been. There's

655
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:22,640
Speaker 1: a place in Portland called Alibi that's like another older one.

656
00:38:22,840 --> 00:38:25,080
Speaker 1: Maybe it is a circle of the sixties or seventies,

657
00:38:25,080 --> 00:38:27,359
Speaker 1: though de'st the crazy. There are a lot of There

658
00:38:27,400 --> 00:38:29,080
Speaker 1: are a lot more on the West coast. That's right,

659
00:38:29,160 --> 00:38:33,640
Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah, the sixties and seventies still had teakey bars.

660
00:38:33,920 --> 00:38:37,600
Speaker 1: We were just seeing the bigger brands, um, their their

661
00:38:37,640 --> 00:38:41,800
Speaker 1: growth kind of slow down. Um kind of eighties and nineties.

662
00:38:41,840 --> 00:38:44,799
Speaker 1: You're not seeing any new tea bars open. But what

663
00:38:45,520 --> 00:38:48,080
Speaker 1: is interesting about the teaky bar formula is it it's

664
00:38:48,120 --> 00:38:51,840
Speaker 1: based on cheap rum, which at the time was it

665
00:38:52,120 --> 00:38:55,719
Speaker 1: the Pacific wasn't. It wasn't in the Pacific yet, So

666
00:38:55,719 --> 00:38:59,920
Speaker 1: so Don, who was kind of a world traveler, he

667
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:02,759
Speaker 1: wasn't necessarily in the military. That's not how he well

668
00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:05,719
Speaker 1: he was later, but that's not how he found Don

669
00:39:05,760 --> 00:39:10,600
Speaker 1: the beach combers my Thai recipe as he thought, what

670
00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:12,480
Speaker 1: is the cheapest liquer I can get my hands on?

671
00:39:12,560 --> 00:39:15,759
Speaker 1: And at that point in the Caribbeans, rum was was

672
00:39:15,920 --> 00:39:19,359
Speaker 1: very inexpensive and very sweet and worked as a fine

673
00:39:19,360 --> 00:39:21,600
Speaker 1: substitute for what he had tried when he was in

674
00:39:21,600 --> 00:39:25,640
Speaker 1: the Pacific. Back to this sort of escapism and the

675
00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:29,000
Speaker 1: fall of the tiki boom, what we see in in

676
00:39:29,160 --> 00:39:33,439
Speaker 1: nineteen nine, UM current President Donald Trump, he made a

677
00:39:33,520 --> 00:39:37,360
Speaker 1: purchase of the Plaza Hotel in New York. He doesn't

678
00:39:37,400 --> 00:39:41,880
Speaker 1: own it anymore, thankfully, But what he did was close

679
00:39:42,120 --> 00:39:45,960
Speaker 1: an original Trader vix um in Midtown Manhattan, which is

680
00:39:46,520 --> 00:39:50,440
Speaker 1: pretty disappointing because it would be really cool to have

681
00:39:50,480 --> 00:39:53,960
Speaker 1: an original total And he thought it was tacky, right,

682
00:39:54,080 --> 00:39:56,480
Speaker 1: or say it wasn't on brand or something. Yeah, he

683
00:39:56,560 --> 00:39:59,560
Speaker 1: said it. It was. Um, it was tacky and it

684
00:39:59,600 --> 00:40:02,320
Speaker 1: wasn't in line with what he would like to achieve.

685
00:40:02,440 --> 00:40:07,600
Speaker 1: You can read the original nine Um article where it's

686
00:40:07,719 --> 00:40:11,360
Speaker 1: literally titled Trump to close ATTACKI Trader vix and the

687
00:40:11,360 --> 00:40:15,839
Speaker 1: New York Times. So it's Trump called it tacky. Yeah. Yeah,

688
00:40:16,600 --> 00:40:20,720
Speaker 1: talk about the pot calling the kettle gold plated. Yeah,

689
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:25,400
Speaker 1: it's definitely ironic. Um. And like Trump has become sort

690
00:40:25,440 --> 00:40:28,880
Speaker 1: of attacking and out of fashion, what we're seeing is

691
00:40:28,880 --> 00:40:32,560
Speaker 1: is this resurgence in in tiki bars. But what we

692
00:40:33,719 --> 00:40:36,880
Speaker 1: can't forget about is the impact this situation had on

693
00:40:36,920 --> 00:40:43,040
Speaker 1: the island of Guam. Guam, like many territories or colonial islands,

694
00:40:43,880 --> 00:40:47,839
Speaker 1: never really gets a fair shake. You know, they're occupied,

695
00:40:47,880 --> 00:40:52,000
Speaker 1: they become an advantageous piece of land, whether for resources

696
00:40:52,120 --> 00:40:56,120
Speaker 1: or military reasons. But when it was time to take

697
00:40:56,160 --> 00:40:58,600
Speaker 1: care of the citizens of Guam who had lost their

698
00:40:58,640 --> 00:41:02,880
Speaker 1: property there belongings, a lot of them their lives. The

699
00:41:02,960 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 1: agreement was that Japan was not responsible. America agreed to

700
00:41:08,440 --> 00:41:13,560
Speaker 1: assume responsibility. But due to high literacy rates, a language

701
00:41:13,560 --> 00:41:17,280
Speaker 1: barrier between the U. S. Navy and locals, no newspaper,

702
00:41:17,320 --> 00:41:21,120
Speaker 1: telephone communication, and only a six month window to file claims,

703
00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:24,040
Speaker 1: many were left without even knowing that there was an

704
00:41:24,040 --> 00:41:29,200
Speaker 1: option for compensation under the Guam Meritorious Claims Act of

705
00:41:31,000 --> 00:41:34,279
Speaker 1: So you're still seeing this kind of today and and

706
00:41:34,320 --> 00:41:38,520
Speaker 1: it ties into modern history as we think about um

707
00:41:38,520 --> 00:41:41,680
Speaker 1: what is owed to two people who are marginalized. So

708
00:41:42,239 --> 00:41:44,960
Speaker 1: in two thousand five this came up again, and we

709
00:41:45,320 --> 00:41:48,040
Speaker 1: had a headed divisive president at this time who was

710
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:52,319
Speaker 1: looking to uh reboot the economy post nine eleven, and

711
00:41:52,360 --> 00:41:56,440
Speaker 1: they were slashing any sort of superfluous or what they

712
00:41:56,480 --> 00:42:01,120
Speaker 1: felt to be extracurricular financial commitments. So we're seeing this

713
00:42:01,200 --> 00:42:04,560
Speaker 1: act get a lot of support in Congress to to

714
00:42:05,120 --> 00:42:08,320
Speaker 1: start to provide reparations to the island and its people.

715
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:13,880
Speaker 1: But his Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Insular Affairs,

716
00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 1: David B. Cohen, said that reasonable people might disagree in

717
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:22,640
Speaker 1: good faith, however, about the appropriate level of financial compensation

718
00:42:22,719 --> 00:42:25,440
Speaker 1: to be paid by the federal government for damages that

719
00:42:25,560 --> 00:42:28,640
Speaker 1: were caused not by the fault of the United States,

720
00:42:28,680 --> 00:42:32,480
Speaker 1: but rather by the fault of a foreign occupying power.

721
00:42:32,960 --> 00:42:37,640
Speaker 1: See Okay, I get I understand why they would make

722
00:42:37,680 --> 00:42:39,760
Speaker 1: that argument, But it reminds me of the old quotation,

723
00:42:39,840 --> 00:42:43,040
Speaker 1: you know, when elephants wage war, only the grass suffers.

724
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:48,600
Speaker 1: There there is an entire not just one episode, there's

725
00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:54,600
Speaker 1: a entire series worth of topics about the the chaos

726
00:42:55,440 --> 00:42:58,880
Speaker 1: rot upon this area of the world, of these island

727
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:04,000
Speaker 1: nations before World War two, after World War two. You know.

728
00:43:04,080 --> 00:43:07,080
Speaker 1: It also reminds me how here in the US nobody

729
00:43:07,160 --> 00:43:11,440
Speaker 1: really talks about the US colonization of the Philippines. Right.

730
00:43:11,480 --> 00:43:14,440
Speaker 1: There's so much stuff that we forget here, and we

731
00:43:14,520 --> 00:43:17,760
Speaker 1: can't really prove this. But it's strange to think whether

732
00:43:18,640 --> 00:43:23,960
Speaker 1: Gordie's adventures influenced Carter's policy later on. It definitely inspired

733
00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 1: him to do stuff, right, but did he was he

734
00:43:27,040 --> 00:43:31,439
Speaker 1: thinking of his uncle when he was working with hostage situations?

735
00:43:31,560 --> 00:43:34,120
Speaker 1: Stuff like that. We don't know, and we probably never

736
00:43:34,160 --> 00:43:38,000
Speaker 1: will unless Jimmy Carter decides to mention it one day,

737
00:43:38,160 --> 00:43:40,200
Speaker 1: we should he just had a talk the other day

738
00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:42,560
Speaker 1: at Emory University. We should try to pop in on

739
00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:46,279
Speaker 1: one and just bring this random question. Um. You know

740
00:43:46,520 --> 00:43:49,080
Speaker 1: something else that's that's important to think about in this

741
00:43:49,239 --> 00:43:53,760
Speaker 1: is the way that these large nations America, England, France, Germany,

742
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:57,120
Speaker 1: all these large countries who have colonized nations in the past,

743
00:43:57,800 --> 00:44:01,120
Speaker 1: when they cause damages to people who aren't major players

744
00:44:01,640 --> 00:44:04,880
Speaker 1: in the game, but actually are kind of vital to

745
00:44:05,040 --> 00:44:07,920
Speaker 1: the creation of the wealth that these countries are desiring.

746
00:44:08,040 --> 00:44:11,120
Speaker 1: So if we look at the enslaved people in America

747
00:44:11,480 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 1: asks and their descendants asking for reparations is a similar situation.

748
00:44:15,920 --> 00:44:19,600
Speaker 1: You can make the argument that well, the Confederate nations,

749
00:44:20,160 --> 00:44:23,719
Speaker 1: they were the ones fighting for slavery. It's over. We

750
00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:27,520
Speaker 1: see that argument comes sometimes we also see the argument

751
00:44:27,600 --> 00:44:29,719
Speaker 1: of well, that was a long time ago or that

752
00:44:29,800 --> 00:44:33,279
Speaker 1: was previous generations, doesn't have anything to do with me.

753
00:44:33,400 --> 00:44:37,120
Speaker 1: But we see the the problems that systemic and institutionalized

754
00:44:37,560 --> 00:44:40,279
Speaker 1: racism and oppression of cause throughout the world. And that's

755
00:44:40,320 --> 00:44:45,839
Speaker 1: why we have massive inequality today throughout nations. And also

756
00:44:45,880 --> 00:44:49,279
Speaker 1: we have to say, of course that these kind of

757
00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:53,879
Speaker 1: impacts are multigenerational. They don't stop just because people die,

758
00:44:54,280 --> 00:44:56,680
Speaker 1: you know, and it affects the children and their children's

759
00:44:56,760 --> 00:45:01,960
Speaker 1: children and so on and this. Okay, so this is

760
00:45:02,120 --> 00:45:04,160
Speaker 1: this is our story, and I think this gives us

761
00:45:04,200 --> 00:45:09,560
Speaker 1: some insight into President Carter, former President Carter that would

762
00:45:09,640 --> 00:45:13,040
Speaker 1: surprise most people. Now Here in Georgia. Of course, we

763
00:45:13,120 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 1: tend to know a little bit more about Carter than

764
00:45:15,160 --> 00:45:18,120
Speaker 1: the average bear, because again, he's got the Carter Center

765
00:45:18,160 --> 00:45:20,759
Speaker 1: in the library here, and teach a Sunday school here

766
00:45:20,800 --> 00:45:24,080
Speaker 1: and speaks at Emory here. Uh. You know, sometimes you

767
00:45:24,120 --> 00:45:26,879
Speaker 1: can see him at the right restaurant. But even here

768
00:45:26,880 --> 00:45:29,640
Speaker 1: in Georgia, a lot of people are unaware of the

769
00:45:29,760 --> 00:45:35,680
Speaker 1: tremendous influence that his uncle had on the young Jimmy Carter. Ryan,

770
00:45:35,840 --> 00:45:41,240
Speaker 1: thank you so much for returning to the show. You know. Yeah,

771
00:45:41,320 --> 00:45:44,960
Speaker 1: where can people learn more about your institution the work

772
00:45:45,040 --> 00:45:48,000
Speaker 1: you guys are doing. Um, you can follow us on

773
00:45:48,040 --> 00:45:53,400
Speaker 1: Instagram at g s U Underscore MHP. That's the Georgia's

774
00:45:53,400 --> 00:45:58,600
Speaker 1: State Master's Program of Historic Preservation and Heritage Preservation is

775
00:45:58,640 --> 00:46:00,920
Speaker 1: what our program is called. But we kind of dabble

776
00:46:00,960 --> 00:46:04,879
Speaker 1: in all sorts of public history and preservation topics. Fantastic

777
00:46:04,920 --> 00:46:07,919
Speaker 1: And while you are on the internet, folks, this does

778
00:46:08,000 --> 00:46:12,360
Speaker 1: conclude our episode, but not our show. This story continues.

779
00:46:12,440 --> 00:46:14,160
Speaker 1: You can be part of it if you check out

780
00:46:14,160 --> 00:46:17,839
Speaker 1: our Facebook group Ridiculous Historians. You can also find us

781
00:46:18,120 --> 00:46:22,120
Speaker 1: as a group and as individuals on Instagram and Twitter.

782
00:46:22,320 --> 00:46:24,960
Speaker 1: I am at Ben Bullan on Instagram, and I am

783
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:27,440
Speaker 1: at Ben bull in hs W on Twitter. And I

784
00:46:27,440 --> 00:46:30,040
Speaker 1: am just a gramster. You can find me at how

785
00:46:30,080 --> 00:46:34,200
Speaker 1: Now Noel Brown Big. Thanks to our super producer Casey

786
00:46:34,239 --> 00:46:37,279
Speaker 1: Pegram to Alex Williams, who composed our track. And it's

787
00:46:37,320 --> 00:46:39,920
Speaker 1: weird because you know, now you're in person, and usually

788
00:46:39,960 --> 00:46:42,960
Speaker 1: when we're talking about you, you're just sort of existing

789
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:45,480
Speaker 1: in the ether of ideas. But you're a real person.

790
00:46:45,520 --> 00:46:48,479
Speaker 1: You're right here, right now, Ryan Barrass, thank you, Yeah,

791
00:46:48,480 --> 00:46:52,040
Speaker 1: thank you guys. Yeah, and all his technicolor tidye glory,

792
00:46:52,200 --> 00:46:55,160
Speaker 1: nice call back. Thanks man Big. Thanks to Gabe Lucier,

793
00:46:55,360 --> 00:47:00,239
Speaker 1: our other research associate and compatriot comrade brother are in

794
00:47:00,400 --> 00:47:02,920
Speaker 1: arms whatever you wanna call it. Thanks to Alex Williams,

795
00:47:02,920 --> 00:47:05,480
Speaker 1: who composed our theme. Thanks to Christopher haciotas here in

796
00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:08,760
Speaker 1: spirit thanks to the quister for not showing up once again.

797
00:47:08,760 --> 00:47:10,279
Speaker 1: But I have a feeling that we're our luck is

798
00:47:10,280 --> 00:47:12,319
Speaker 1: going to run out on that very soon. Thanks to

799
00:47:12,360 --> 00:47:15,440
Speaker 1: you Ben for having such a well quoft a bit

800
00:47:15,440 --> 00:47:18,400
Speaker 1: of facial hair going on today. It's very very dapper looking.

801
00:47:18,640 --> 00:47:20,920
Speaker 1: Thanks man. This is something that we don't see a

802
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,200
Speaker 1: lot because this is an audio podcast. But my favorite

803
00:47:24,239 --> 00:47:27,360
Speaker 1: thing to do nowadays is to flip the phone the

804
00:47:27,400 --> 00:47:30,120
Speaker 1: headphones over so I look like either Jordie LaForge or

805
00:47:30,160 --> 00:47:33,040
Speaker 1: Cyclops when you guys think, or a little bit like RoboCop.

806
00:47:33,040 --> 00:47:35,759
Speaker 1: Maybe oh yeah, yeah, there we go. Picture it. We'll

807
00:47:35,800 --> 00:47:46,680
Speaker 1: see you next time. Cox. For more podcasts for My

808
00:47:46,719 --> 00:47:49,360
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,

809
00:47:49,480 --> 00:47:51,600
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.