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Speaker 1: Hey, everybody. You may not know this yet, and if

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Speaker 1: you don't, prepare to be blown away. We are creating

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Speaker 1: right now the first ever Stuff you Should Know book.

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Speaker 1: on over to stuff you Should Read books dot com.

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Speaker 1: It's a very beautiful little web page and it's got

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Speaker 1: all the information. And if you already pre ordered, can't

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Speaker 1: you just like upload your receipt and get that pre

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Speaker 1: And it's a poster that you will love and cherish

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Speaker 1: That's right, everyone, We couldn't be more excited about this book.

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Speaker 1: It's really coming together. Well, it's us through and through

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Speaker 1: and you can go check out some excerpts at stuff

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Speaker 1: you Should Read books dot com. Welcome to Stuff you

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Speaker 1: Should know, a production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey,

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Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's

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Speaker 1: Charles W. Chuck Bryant right over there. Jerry's out there somewhere,

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Speaker 1: and this is stuff you should know. You know, Chuck,

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Speaker 1: I have to say yes. Every once in a while,

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Speaker 1: the amazing theme song from our short lived television show

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Speaker 1: comes into my head and it'll just it's just a

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Speaker 1: complete earworm because I just hear the end of it

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Speaker 1: over and over and over again, and it's actually pretty

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Speaker 1: pleasant night. It doesn't bother me. I love it. I

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Speaker 1: haven't heard that song in a while. Well, you need

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Speaker 1: to go listen. That was the Henry Clay people, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Our buddies, Joey and Andy Sierra California boys, Southern California

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Speaker 1: boys men. Didn't didn't they go to like Harvard or

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Speaker 1: something crazy like that. Joey ended up going to Harvard

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Speaker 1: and then I think Andy went to a f I

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Speaker 1: and then Joey I think went back to film school

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Speaker 1: and they're both writing, uh you know, screenwriting. Man. That's great,

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Speaker 1: and he's got a he wrote it the this uh

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Speaker 1: Andy Sandberg movie that's that's coming out soon. Really what

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Speaker 1: which what what's it called? Uh? It is called Palm Springs?

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Speaker 1: I think why? And he wrote it? Yeah, dude, that's fantastic.

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Speaker 1: Congratulations And he wrote on the TV show Lodge forty nine. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I haven't seen the Springs, but that, um, that guy

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Speaker 1: Kurt Rustling Goldie hans Son. I love that guy. I

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Speaker 1: think he's one of the coolest people walking around on

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Speaker 1: the planet today. Yeah, I haven't seen Lodge forty Nine's

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Speaker 1: supposed to be awesome. And um, Andy was a writer's

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Speaker 1: assistant and then ended up on the staff and they're

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Speaker 1: they're both doing great. Man, that's great. A little baby

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Speaker 1: now they're both married. Nice man, that's nice. And that's

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Speaker 1: an update on the cra Club as um, let's see

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Speaker 1: what else? How was it? How did did that come

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Speaker 1: into your head? Though? The song? Like? What made you

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Speaker 1: think of that? Nothing? I was just out back, like

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Speaker 1: mowing the lawn with my big old lawnmower. Uh, and

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Speaker 1: it just popped in my head. I was probably thinking

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Speaker 1: of something I had to do that had to do

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Speaker 1: with stuff you should know, and I thought stuff you

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Speaker 1: should know? And when I thought it, I thought it

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Speaker 1: as stuff you should know. Duing it. This is the

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Speaker 1: then it just played on a loop. This is the

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Speaker 1: second time you mentioned the size of your lawnmower. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and now you just gotta send me a picture. Is

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Speaker 1: this one of these things that you stand it and

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Speaker 1: it and it wheels you around like some weird land

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Speaker 1: speeder you mean, like a skag or something. Now, this

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Speaker 1: is just a good old fashioned toro. That is because

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Speaker 1: it's gas powered. I got it like on super discount. Um,

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Speaker 1: because everybody's making like really good electric lawnmowers, um, but

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Speaker 1: this one was you know, it was on discount, and

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Speaker 1: I like the look of it. Yeah, it's a good

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Speaker 1: looking more huh. Yeah. I was like, I like your style.

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Speaker 1: Is it red? Yep? Yeah, it was red toros. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's nice. It takes you back to days of paper

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Speaker 1: routes and stuff like that, don't I thought you were

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Speaker 1: mentioning the song because you were thinking of the song

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Speaker 1: Flagpole Sita by Harvey Danger. No, I wasn't at all. Okay,

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Speaker 1: but that's a great segue, Chuck, because it just so happens.

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Speaker 1: And you may be aware of this for talking about

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Speaker 1: Flagpole sitting to day in this episode, right, and I've

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Speaker 1: been singing that song in my head all day now,

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Speaker 1: I don't. I don't know that song? You know it?

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Speaker 1: It was a well maybe not, it was a It

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Speaker 1: was a top forty hit in the nineties, kind of

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Speaker 1: during the grunge era. It was. It was a power

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Speaker 1: pop hit that kind of Oh, don't, don't, don't, don't,

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Speaker 1: don't do do wait, don't said it at it? No,

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Speaker 1: my band actually covers a flagpoles. It it's a fun song. Okay,

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Speaker 1: that's great. I'm gonna have to go listen to it

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Speaker 1: because I feel like I'm missing out. But what that

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Speaker 1: song is? That song about flagpole sitting is about shipwreck

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Speaker 1: Kelly in particular. No, it's not. But it does have

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Speaker 1: one line that says, run it up the flagpole and

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Speaker 1: see And that's the only time it references flagpoles at all?

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Speaker 1: Sees what who salutes? But no one ever does? I think?

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Speaker 1: Is the next line? Mm hmm that rings a bill

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Speaker 1: I have, but the again end then and then I

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Speaker 1: was again to the mirror a little bit clearer. Run

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Speaker 1: it up the flagpole and see who salutes? But no

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Speaker 1: one ever does? Yeah, I'm not sick, but not well?

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Speaker 1: Who is that Harvey danger? Danger? Okay? Yeah, that's a

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Speaker 1: great song. I love it. Yeah. Who fellow podcasting friend

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Speaker 1: John Roderick. Actually, uh, Sean Nelson was a friend of

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Speaker 1: his in Seattle and Nate he played bass for a

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Speaker 1: little all in Harvey Danger. Oh very wow, man, this

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Speaker 1: is all coming first. So I got one more for you.

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Speaker 1: I used to have that song and I don't know

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Speaker 1: where I downloaded it from. This would have been probably

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Speaker 1: back in the napster days or something, um, and it

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Speaker 1: was mislabeled as Brian Jones how massacre. And I was

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Speaker 1: always like, this is not sound like Brian Jones how massacre.

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Speaker 1: Now I know it most definitely wasn't Brian Jones hown massacre. Wow. Alright,

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Speaker 1: we haven't even talked about flag pole sitting yet. No,

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Speaker 1: we haven't, um, which is a crime because it's actually

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Speaker 1: one of the more interesting, weird old fads that's ever

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Speaker 1: come this way in America, and it was in the

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Speaker 1: twenties started. We actually we know who patient zero was

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Speaker 1: a flagpole sitting and it's easy to tell because it

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Speaker 1: is such a bizarre thing to do that if you

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Speaker 1: can find the person who who who did it first,

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Speaker 1: who claims to have done it first, they're probably correct,

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Speaker 1: And in this case, you can trace it back to

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Speaker 1: sometime around January, supposedly potentially in Hollywood, California, part of

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Speaker 1: Los Angeles, and there was a man named Alvin Shipwreck

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Speaker 1: Kelly who supposedly climbed up on a flagpole as part

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Speaker 1: of a promotion for a movie and sat there for

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Speaker 1: full thirteen hours and thirteen minutes to help draw a crowd.

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Speaker 1: And boyditty ever, yeah, which you know, Uh, that sounds

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Speaker 1: like a long time to sit on a flagpole, but

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Speaker 1: that is kids stuff, yeah, compared to where this is. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: for sure, that's an appertif. But it's a good first attempt,

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Speaker 1: you know. Yeah. And so you know, it sounds strange

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Speaker 1: because when you think of a flagpole, you're like, what

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Speaker 1: are they sitting on? It's a it's a modified flagpole

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Speaker 1: that basically there are different kinds, but um usually it's

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Speaker 1: sort of like a bar stool at the top of

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Speaker 1: a flagpole and it's that low fi and you climb

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Speaker 1: up there and you sit and that's all you do.

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Speaker 1: That's that's it. I mean, whatever else you want to do, well,

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Speaker 1: sure you do use yourself or whatever that's up to you.

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Speaker 1: But as far as being considered a flagpole sitter. That's it.

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Speaker 1: You sit on top of a flagpole for as long

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Speaker 1: as you can. All right, So let's talk about this guy,

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Speaker 1: because Shipwreck Kelly was a pretty interesting character. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: I have to say there's a Memory Palace episode about

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Speaker 1: him that I specifically didn't listen to you beforehand because

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Speaker 1: I didn't want to unconsciously rip it off. Go listen

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Speaker 1: to that, yeah, or Buddy Nate, I'm gonna check that

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Speaker 1: out for sure. So Alvin Kelly, Uh, he was born

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Speaker 1: Aloysius Anthony Kelly in New York City, in Hell's Kitchen

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Speaker 1: in a tenement in eight and had a very sad

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Speaker 1: start to his life and that his father was had

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Speaker 1: already passed before he was born. His mother passed in childbirth,

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Speaker 1: and that basically meant he was shuttled around two relatives

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Speaker 1: and orphanages from you know, the minute he took his

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Speaker 1: first breath. Yeah. Um, And apparently from a pretty pretty

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Speaker 1: early age he would do things like climb flagpoles and

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Speaker 1: other tall stuff and like working at heights became a

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Speaker 1: kind of a recurring theme in his life. Um. Was

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Speaker 1: supposedly by age seven, he was climbing flagpoles. Within a

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Speaker 1: few years after that, he was starting to scale the

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Speaker 1: facades of some of the buildings in his neighborhood. And

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Speaker 1: by the time he was thirteen. And bear in mind,

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Speaker 1: if this guy's biography seems a little thin, he just

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Speaker 1: came out of nowhere in n for sitting on a flagpole.

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Speaker 1: So all of the info about him came from him

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Speaker 1: to reporters who were reporting in the nineteen twenties. So

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Speaker 1: just fabrications are flying around left and right. But um,

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Speaker 1: supposedly he ran away at age thirteen and ran off

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Speaker 1: to join uh the crew of a cargo ship and

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Speaker 1: start his life sailing the seas. Yeah, and he did

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Speaker 1: a lot of kind of odd jobs, or maybe not

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Speaker 1: odd jobs, but just jobs that didn't have anything to

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Speaker 1: do with one another. Uh. Over the next couple of decades,

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Speaker 1: he was in the movies as a a stand in

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Speaker 1: and a double He was a stunt person, a stunt pilot,

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Speaker 1: high diver, a boxer. Uh, this part I love. There's

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Speaker 1: actually a name for people that repair church steeples, and

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Speaker 1: what is that steeple jack. He was a steeplejack. That

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Speaker 1: is definitely a band name for sure. Steeple Jack oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: it sounds like maybe an industrial band, but like on

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Speaker 1: the light side, like they like they're technically too melodic

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Speaker 1: to actually be considered industrial, but they still call themselves industrial.

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Speaker 1: That's become my favorite part of this whole band name thing,

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Speaker 1: is you describing what kind of band it is? Okay,

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Speaker 1: well thanks man. That that that makes me feel warm

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Speaker 1: and funny. So, um, World War One comes along, and

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Speaker 1: he was in the Naval Auxiliary Reserve as an ensign

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Speaker 1: and served on the USS Edgar f Lukenbach during that war. Yep,

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Speaker 1: so he did have some sort of well I should say,

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Speaker 1: I don't know if anybody's corroborated that, um, but we'll

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Speaker 1: just take all that at face value because it doesn't

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Speaker 1: really matter at this point. But what he eventually picked

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Speaker 1: up the nickname shipwreck. And there's a lot of different

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Speaker 1: um explanations for this, and he's given or he gave

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Speaker 1: multiple different explanations depending on what reporter he was talking to.

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Speaker 1: But one of the numbers that gets bandied about pretty

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Speaker 1: frequently is that shipwreck Kelly was so named because he

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Speaker 1: survived thirty two different shipwrecks at sea. And where this

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Speaker 1: is where shipwrecks tend to happen with the good old days. Third, yeah,

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Speaker 1: up stories about yourself. Do you remember when we talked

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Speaker 1: about um, we did an episode on the World's Either

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Speaker 1: Luckiest or Unluckiest People? And do you remember that one

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Speaker 1: guy He was like, I I survived a car that

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Speaker 1: fell off a cliff, and I survived a train wreck

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Speaker 1: and all that. He was doing his jam in like

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Speaker 1: two thousand five, remember, was he? Yeah, he was pretty

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Speaker 1: pretty recent if I remember correctly. Remember his son came

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Speaker 1: out was like, everybody, this is not true, right, Like,

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Speaker 1: none of what you're talking about is true. Well, we

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Speaker 1: did had just fooled you all. We don't know if

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Speaker 1: a shipwreck Kelly actually survived the Titanic like he claimed,

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Speaker 1: but we do know that he was not on the

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Speaker 1: roster on the Titanic, So I am going to venture

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Speaker 1: to say that he made that one up. And there

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Speaker 1: were three Kelly's on board, but who were survivors? But

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Speaker 1: all three of them were women, So yeah, he probably

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Speaker 1: wasn't on the Titanic. Maybe he did survive from shipwrecks.

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Speaker 1: He was at sea most likely, But the point is

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Speaker 1: that they call him shipwreck Kelly, and I guess somebody

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Speaker 1: went to the trouble of digging up that. Uh. Some

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Speaker 1: reporters who covered his boxing career are probably the likeliest

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Speaker 1: source for where he got his nickname shipwreck, right, which

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Speaker 1: I love because I guess he wasn't a great boxer,

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Speaker 1: because they said that he was often adrift and ready

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Speaker 1: to sink that great shipwreck Kelly. It's a great nickname

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Speaker 1: and an even better origin story than surviving thirty two

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Speaker 1: shipwrecks if you asked me. Yeah. And the other thing

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Speaker 1: we don't know for sure is even if that Hollywood

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Speaker 1: movie premiere story is correct in his first major outing

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Speaker 1: as a flagpolesitter, because uh, yet another story says no,

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Speaker 1: this is actually in Philadelphia at a department store and

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Speaker 1: he just did it on a dare and the department

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Speaker 1: store got a lot of business because people are standing

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Speaker 1: around looking and then doing some shopping. So they were like, Hey,

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Speaker 1: stay up there and I'll give you some extra dough. Yeah. So,

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Speaker 1: either way, it's pretty widely held that Shipwreck Kelly was

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Speaker 1: the guy who started the flagpole sitting craze. And it

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Speaker 1: was a craze because this is a time where you

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Speaker 1: could go sit on a flagpole for thirteen hours and

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Speaker 1: thirteen minutes, and newspapers around the country would pick up

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Speaker 1: the story and write about it. Um, and you would say,

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Speaker 1: become famous overnight. And that's exactly what happened to Shipwreck Kelly.

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Speaker 1: So that's prong one towards this becoming a fad in

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Speaker 1: the nineties. The other criteria is that um, people have

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Speaker 1: to want to topple that record, and that was very

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Speaker 1: widespread at the time too, because the nineteen twenties were

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Speaker 1: actually really big into fads, like people would take up

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Speaker 1: weird fads and just go nuts over for basically the

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Speaker 1: whole decade. Yeah, you know, people had time, and they

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Speaker 1: had fewer distractions. Yeah, no TV. So like someone doing

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Speaker 1: a dance a thon for twenty eight hours or sitting

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Speaker 1: on a flagpole for a day. You know, it's a

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Speaker 1: it's an interesting story. Back then it's sad, but that

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Speaker 1: that was interesting, but it was so uh well, we'll

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Speaker 1: talk about dance marathons and then we'll take a break. Okay, okay, okay,

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Speaker 1: Oh wait, I got that backwards, Chuck. I just realized

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Speaker 1: hopefully Jerry figured it out and there was an ad

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Speaker 1: in there somewhere. I think we should just leave it

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Speaker 1: just like that though. That'll be fun. Okay, So um,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about marathon's. Dance marathon's now after the

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Speaker 1: ad break, despite what I said before, and dance marathons

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Speaker 1: are a super twenties example of a crazy fad that

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Speaker 1: kind of came along and got everybody by the hackles,

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Speaker 1: and people across the country started entering basically dance marathon

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Speaker 1: competitions because of one person, one woman, a dance instructor

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Speaker 1: named Alma Cummings, that's right, thirty two years old. She

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Speaker 1: danced for twenty seven hours at the Audubon Ballroom in

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Speaker 1: New York in nine three with six different dance partners.

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Speaker 1: And uh, it was a weird time because it wasn't

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Speaker 1: just dancing, it was endurance challenges as a whole. We're

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Speaker 1: just all the rage and punishing your bodies and all

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Speaker 1: these weird random ways from yo yoing too hula hooping

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Speaker 1: to rocking in a rocking chair or skipping rope uh

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Speaker 1: to dancing dancing was the big one. That's where you

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Speaker 1: You know, if you see these videos of these marathon

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Speaker 1: dance competitions, it's just it looks like hell on Earth.

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Speaker 1: It looks awful. Yeah, oh yeah, they didn't seem very

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Speaker 1: fun at all, but um, Alma Cummings just kicked the

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Speaker 1: whole thing off. And again, just like Shipwreck Kelly, who

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Speaker 1: would follow I guess a year later, um or even yeah,

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Speaker 1: about a year later. Uh, she got a lot of publicity.

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Speaker 1: There's like a famous photo of her with her feet

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Speaker 1: in a tub of water soaking at home and she's

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Speaker 1: holding up her shoes and they have holes in the

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Speaker 1: souls where you know, she wore holes from dancing for

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Speaker 1: twenty seven hours. And I guess, like you're saying people

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Speaker 1: were bored or there wasn't as much to do, but

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Speaker 1: also there really seems to just be a profound hunger

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Speaker 1: for celebrity however you can get it, and that seemed

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Speaker 1: to be like really drive people who wanted to be like, well,

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Speaker 1: if this lady got this much attention for dancing twenty

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Speaker 1: seven straight hours, maybe I can get even more attention

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Speaker 1: for dancing thirty straight hours. And so within just like

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Speaker 1: I think three weeks of Alma Cummings setting this record

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Speaker 1: for dancing, um, it had been broken nine times at

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Speaker 1: least from people trying to seek the same kind of

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Speaker 1: publicity she got. Yeah, and you know, it's funny. It

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Speaker 1: really like we talked about these days, how everyone wants

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Speaker 1: their ten minutes or they want to be reality show

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Speaker 1: famous or whatever, and I been whittled down to ten Now.

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Speaker 1: I thought it was like fifteen. Well, like that's something new,

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Speaker 1: and it's really not like this is sort of this

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Speaker 1: The version of that back then was I want to

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Speaker 1: be famous, I want my names in the papers, but

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Speaker 1: I'm not particularly skilled enough to do anything to do that.

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Speaker 1: So I'll rock in a rocking chair for three days. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know, and hopefully they will come. Um rock, they

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Speaker 1: will come. And it's that was a pity laugh at best,

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Speaker 1: but I appreciate. Well it's a bad joke admittedly, Um,

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Speaker 1: but it would. And we we should shout out a

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Speaker 1: bunch of great websites here because um this next bit

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Speaker 1: came from Atlas Obscura, one of our favorite sites and

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Speaker 1: also our dearest of old sites that we always have

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Speaker 1: loved Mental Floss, Ripley's History Daily, j Mark Powell, and

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Speaker 1: Historic Pellem, which is great, but um, Atlas Obscura talks

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Speaker 1: about the in the thirties and this is really kind

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Speaker 1: of depressing. Um during the depression. It's very appropriate is

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Speaker 1: that sometimes people would enter these dance marathons because it

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Speaker 1: would be somewhere they could sleep and eat for a

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Speaker 1: week at a time when they didn't necessarily have a

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Speaker 1: home or food. Yeah, it's extremely depressing, or just the

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Speaker 1: prize money that was offered in the depression might be

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Speaker 1: enough to keep your house from being foreclosed on. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: the thing is is, you know, you can blame promoters

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Speaker 1: for continuing this long beyond the fad, but the promoters

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Speaker 1: wouldn't have been putting these on and offering these price

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Speaker 1: this prize money where it not for all the crowds

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Speaker 1: that would show up every day to watch these people

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Speaker 1: get increasingly closer to you know, catastrophic exhaustion from from

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Speaker 1: dance marathons. Because like there were there were rules where

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Speaker 1: you know, probably early on in the dance marathon, um,

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Speaker 1: you could sleep or rest for fifteen minutes of every hour,

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Speaker 1: and then after like a week a week of this

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Speaker 1: dance marathon going on, the promoter might be like, okay, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, we need to step things up a little

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Speaker 1: bit and you will now have three minutes per hour

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Speaker 1: every twenty four hour period in a day to where

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Speaker 1: you can rest and then towards the end, they'd be like,

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Speaker 1: no rest. I think I read about one where the

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Speaker 1: last fifty seven hours of a multi week um dance

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Speaker 1: marathon was like I had no rest. So these people

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Speaker 1: dance for more than two straight days constantly. You had

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Speaker 1: to constantly be in motion and your knees couldn't touch

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Speaker 1: the ground or else you'd be disqualified. Yeah, and if

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Speaker 1: you look at footage of this stuff, I mean it's charitable,

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Speaker 1: we'll call what they're doing is dancing. Toward the end,

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Speaker 1: it's just hanging. It looks like two corpses hanging on

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Speaker 1: each other, sort of swaying back and forth. Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: don't get I mean any of these things, even the

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Speaker 1: modern day versions of like these contest where you have

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Speaker 1: to keep your hand on a car or whatever, oh man,

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Speaker 1: or sit in the car. I knew a guy that

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Speaker 1: did one of those where you try to win a

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Speaker 1: Volkswagen Beetle by sitting in it with four other people

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Speaker 1: in a mall. I'm just like, oh, yeah, you told

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Speaker 1: us that story before. Did he win or not? I

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Speaker 1: think he did, But there's just no way kill me. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it would be really awful for sure, because let's say,

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Speaker 1: for one of those contests. Let's say don't win, then

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Speaker 1: you've just sat in a car with three strangers for

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Speaker 1: a week and he didn't even get the car. But

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Speaker 1: even if you did get the car, imagine yourself five

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Speaker 1: years on and that car is like like curst, there's

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Speaker 1: tears in the seats or something like that, you know,

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Speaker 1: and like the glove compartment won't close. It's you know,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I guess you've got a story to tell

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Speaker 1: a cocktail parties, but even that would wear thin after

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Speaker 1: a while. But but Chuck, we need people to do

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Speaker 1: stuff like that because there's something about contests like this.

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Speaker 1: There's something about fads like flagpole sitting that keep humanity

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Speaker 1: from becoming too cerebral, you know what I mean, from

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Speaker 1: just becoming like computers. Basically, we need people to do

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Speaker 1: stuff like this because it brings out some juvenile something

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Speaker 1: in us that makes us want to find out about

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Speaker 1: it or learn about it or talk about it. And

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Speaker 1: I think that's good. I think that's healthy for our species.

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Speaker 1: All right, it's my it's my take. It's genuinely off

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Speaker 1: the cuff. I'm actually just surprised at myself that I

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Speaker 1: just said that out loud. You're just riffing. Yeah, so

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Speaker 1: shipwreck Kelly back to flagpole sitting. Uh, that initial thirteen

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Speaker 1: minutes sit, like you said, inspired so many others to

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Speaker 1: break it, and it was getting broken in pretty short order. Um,

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Speaker 1: kind of like the dance a Thons. That was a

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Speaker 1: woman named Bobby Mack from l A who did it.

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Speaker 1: A guy named Joe hold Him Powers who did this

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Speaker 1: in Chicago for sixteen days, um, another guy for fifty

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Speaker 1: one days named Bill Bill Penfield. Yeah, so so let's

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Speaker 1: point this out. Take a second here, ship Breck Kelly

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Speaker 1: did thirteen hours and kicked off a national fad. These

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Speaker 1: people are now in two weeks at a time. Fifty

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Speaker 1: one days is more than seven weeks up there. It's

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Speaker 1: pretty impressive. I'm impressed at least. Yeah, are you bucking

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Speaker 1: the cerebral yes? Right now? Can you tell uh? Let

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Speaker 1: me see here. In the twenties, it was a fifteen

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Speaker 1: year old boy, um who set the kid record for

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Speaker 1: ten days, ten hours, ten minutes, and ten seconds. I

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Speaker 1: think that was planned. I yeah, if not, then but

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Speaker 1: see there you go, Chuck, we're thinking about that. It's

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Speaker 1: making us think. This little kid is making us think

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Speaker 1: we got to avoid that it needs to be random,

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Speaker 1: random combinations of no so we don't start thinking about it.

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Speaker 1: We should also point out that not everyone was like, oh,

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Speaker 1: this is the best thing ever. In Cosmopolitan magazine, Cosmo

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Speaker 1: called it competitive uh imbecility. Yeah, this is fine, we

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Speaker 1: need that too. I have to say, I want to

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Speaker 1: say something. Here is a little p s A. This

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Speaker 1: might not even ever make it in the final edit,

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Speaker 1: so I'll just say it to you. How about that?

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Speaker 1: I would say, the last like few weeks of episodes, Um,

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Speaker 1: there's been like some some good ones here there, but

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Speaker 1: overall I find that they've been less good because I

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Speaker 1: am so sick of myself because we've been so entrenched

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Speaker 1: in the book right now, so it's like living breathing

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Speaker 1: s y s K, which is us, and having to

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Speaker 1: confront and like myself and my own personality and sense

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Speaker 1: of humor and whether that's actually funny, and just constantly

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Speaker 1: thinking about this on top of doing the podcast, on

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Speaker 1: top of the other stuff we're trying to do now too,

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Speaker 1: and I am so sick of myself. I can barely

423
00:25:08,160 --> 00:25:12,440
Speaker 1: tolerate listening to myself talk. So if anyone's picked up

424
00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:15,720
Speaker 1: on the last few episodes, like in the last few weeks,

425
00:25:15,720 --> 00:25:19,560
Speaker 1: just being a little ho hum, that's why. And I apologize.

426
00:25:19,640 --> 00:25:23,520
Speaker 1: Maybe we'll go back and redo them one day. News

427
00:25:23,560 --> 00:25:29,000
Speaker 1: to me, I think, okay, you've been great. Hey, thanks

428
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:31,199
Speaker 1: a lot, man, That's ultimately what I was fishing for.

429
00:25:31,520 --> 00:25:33,400
Speaker 1: Al Right, well, if you want to cut that part out,

430
00:25:33,480 --> 00:25:36,560
Speaker 1: let's let me pick this up by saying, and I'm

431
00:25:36,600 --> 00:25:43,880
Speaker 1: sure you've made a great point, Josh. So so back

432
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,040
Speaker 1: to Kelly. Right, you've got all these what I'm sure

433
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:51,800
Speaker 1: shipwrecked Kelly deemed slack jawed, yokel's ho homes, that kind

434
00:25:51,800 --> 00:25:55,000
Speaker 1: of thing. Um who were out there trying to topple

435
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 1: his record, and they did, some did topple his record,

436
00:25:57,720 --> 00:26:00,520
Speaker 1: but nobody had turned this into a business like shipwreck

437
00:26:00,600 --> 00:26:04,480
Speaker 1: Kelly had. Here was a one man money making machine

438
00:26:05,160 --> 00:26:07,679
Speaker 1: who made his money just by sitting on top of

439
00:26:07,720 --> 00:26:10,320
Speaker 1: a flagpole. Good money because he was really good at

440
00:26:10,359 --> 00:26:12,680
Speaker 1: self promoting, Like there wasn't a reporter who's the year.

441
00:26:12,720 --> 00:26:15,159
Speaker 1: He wouldn't bend if he got the chance. And in

442
00:26:15,320 --> 00:26:19,160
Speaker 1: these reports um or these articles, he would say things like, yeah,

443
00:26:19,200 --> 00:26:21,320
Speaker 1: I'm in town for this, but if anybody has any

444
00:26:21,320 --> 00:26:24,080
Speaker 1: other offers, I'm wide open. And I'm staying at you know,

445
00:26:24,359 --> 00:26:28,239
Speaker 1: the Cambridge Arms um I Tinerant hotel for the next

446
00:26:28,280 --> 00:26:30,040
Speaker 1: few days. If somebody wants to get in touch with

447
00:26:30,080 --> 00:26:32,560
Speaker 1: me there with a job offer, like he was really

448
00:26:32,600 --> 00:26:37,760
Speaker 1: good at at attracting job offers, specifically for flagpole sitting. Yeah,

449
00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:40,280
Speaker 1: and he made good dough for back then. I mean,

450
00:26:40,280 --> 00:26:43,200
Speaker 1: this is good money anytime. If he made a hundred

451
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:46,439
Speaker 1: dollars an hour like he claimed to um, other people said, now,

452
00:26:46,480 --> 00:26:48,480
Speaker 1: it really wasn't that much. It was probably closer to

453
00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:51,200
Speaker 1: anywhere between a hundred and five hundred dollars a day.

454
00:26:51,560 --> 00:26:55,760
Speaker 1: Still a lot of money. And um, like you said,

455
00:26:55,760 --> 00:26:59,920
Speaker 1: it was like he was almost like a celebrity version

456
00:26:59,920 --> 00:27:04,840
Speaker 1: of a sign spinner, Like if you could pay George

457
00:27:04,880 --> 00:27:09,119
Speaker 1: Clooney to sign spin in front of your mobile phone store.

458
00:27:09,880 --> 00:27:12,760
Speaker 1: Uh huh. That was sort of what Chiprette Kelly was.

459
00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:16,960
Speaker 1: That's a great one I got into. It's almost like

460
00:27:17,119 --> 00:27:20,240
Speaker 1: if there was a cult of personality built up around

461
00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:24,960
Speaker 1: like the flapping dancing windsock guy that they put out

462
00:27:24,960 --> 00:27:28,520
Speaker 1: in front of like mattress mattress stores in like two

463
00:27:28,520 --> 00:27:32,160
Speaker 1: thousand five. Ye I love those dudes. Okay, those are

464
00:27:32,160 --> 00:27:36,440
Speaker 1: fun both I think both of those are high quality analogies. Well,

465
00:27:36,480 --> 00:27:40,320
Speaker 1: we'll see which one Jerry's is in the end it okay, uh,

466
00:27:40,400 --> 00:27:41,760
Speaker 1: let me see here here here are some of his

467
00:27:41,840 --> 00:27:45,720
Speaker 1: longer sits. He did a hundred and forty six hours

468
00:27:45,760 --> 00:27:50,719
Speaker 1: at the Old Westgate Hotel in Kansas City. Three hundred

469
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:54,520
Speaker 1: and twelve hours in Newark, New Jersey, atop the St.

470
00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:59,239
Speaker 1: Francis Hotel. That's pretty good. Sure, I don't know what

471
00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:03,960
Speaker 1: that is in days, but three twelve hours. Let's see

472
00:28:04,480 --> 00:28:07,080
Speaker 1: if you divided that by twenty four, as you should,

473
00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:10,280
Speaker 1: you would come up with something along the lines of

474
00:28:10,359 --> 00:28:14,240
Speaker 1: thirteen days on the nose. M all right, Well, how

475
00:28:14,240 --> 00:28:17,240
Speaker 1: about twenty two days? And this was in conjunction with

476
00:28:17,240 --> 00:28:22,160
Speaker 1: a dance marathon at none other than Madison Square Garden. Yeah,

477
00:28:22,200 --> 00:28:23,520
Speaker 1: because I don't know if we said or not, but

478
00:28:23,560 --> 00:28:26,000
Speaker 1: there was a dance marathon at Madison Square Gardens that

479
00:28:26,040 --> 00:28:29,720
Speaker 1: was actually shut down by the Health Department because they

480
00:28:29,760 --> 00:28:32,679
Speaker 1: decided to have gone on too long ten days, and

481
00:28:32,680 --> 00:28:36,200
Speaker 1: that it deemed a threat to the health of the participants.

482
00:28:36,800 --> 00:28:39,080
Speaker 1: That wasn't the one that he he sat in, but

483
00:28:39,160 --> 00:28:42,720
Speaker 1: there was one the following year where for what was

484
00:28:42,760 --> 00:28:46,840
Speaker 1: it twenty two days. That means that the dance marathon

485
00:28:46,920 --> 00:28:50,080
Speaker 1: went on for twenty two days. But imagine that. So

486
00:28:50,120 --> 00:28:54,680
Speaker 1: you've got these two endurance fads just interweaved in this

487
00:28:54,720 --> 00:28:57,640
Speaker 1: way that the universe almost like collapses in on itself

488
00:28:57,680 --> 00:29:00,840
Speaker 1: because they're put together too too close together there, you know.

489
00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:04,120
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, And here's how he would do it. He

490
00:29:04,120 --> 00:29:06,600
Speaker 1: would sit on a on that bar stool like thing,

491
00:29:07,520 --> 00:29:12,920
Speaker 1: and it was padded and he would, um, you know,

492
00:29:13,400 --> 00:29:17,680
Speaker 1: eat and smoke cigarettes and shave apparently, and they would

493
00:29:17,680 --> 00:29:19,720
Speaker 1: send this up stuff up in like a with a

494
00:29:19,760 --> 00:29:23,560
Speaker 1: bucket and a rope and tell him how he would sleep.

495
00:29:23,560 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 1: Because this is what I really kind of wanted to know. So,

496
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 1: so you said his his seat was like a bar

497
00:29:31,720 --> 00:29:36,360
Speaker 1: stool around bar stool basically, right, and um, it was

498
00:29:36,400 --> 00:29:39,200
Speaker 1: on a pole, flag pole appropriately, And then in the

499
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 1: flag pole you'd have two holes drilled just beneath the seat.

500
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:44,280
Speaker 1: And now that I'm doing it, I'm like, that's really

501
00:29:44,320 --> 00:29:46,600
Speaker 1: hard to reach. So now I'm questioning whether this is

502
00:29:46,640 --> 00:29:52,640
Speaker 1: true or not. Maybe so, but he so he would

503
00:29:52,760 --> 00:29:55,960
Speaker 1: plug his his thumbs into those holes drilled into each

504
00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:58,680
Speaker 1: side of the flagpole, so that when he started to

505
00:29:58,760 --> 00:30:02,040
Speaker 1: lean forward, the pressure from that the flagpole on his

506
00:30:02,080 --> 00:30:05,040
Speaker 1: thumbs would kind of cut into his skin and wake

507
00:30:05,080 --> 00:30:08,000
Speaker 1: him up just enough that he would adjust himself. And

508
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:10,640
Speaker 1: apparently he got so good at this that he would

509
00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:14,000
Speaker 1: adjust himself to sit back up so he wouldn't fall

510
00:30:14,080 --> 00:30:16,680
Speaker 1: over off of the flagpole while he was still sleeping,

511
00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:18,520
Speaker 1: like he wouldn't he wouldn't wake up. He could just

512
00:30:18,560 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 1: adjust himself in his sleep, that's right. And he'd have

513
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:23,040
Speaker 1: his little uh, I don't know if they're a little bit.

514
00:30:23,040 --> 00:30:26,240
Speaker 1: He would have his ankles locked around the pole and

515
00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:32,240
Speaker 1: apparently would tether a leg to keep him from a catastrophe.

516
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:35,400
Speaker 1: But I I think it's very dubious that that was

517
00:30:35,560 --> 00:30:40,840
Speaker 1: a solid life saving rig. Yeah, And I mean, like

518
00:30:40,880 --> 00:30:44,400
Speaker 1: some of these flagpoles, he's sitting on fifty ft um

519
00:30:44,520 --> 00:30:46,560
Speaker 1: one of them. I guess the impression I had the

520
00:30:46,560 --> 00:30:50,880
Speaker 1: one that you mentioned on um Kansas City's Westgate Hotel

521
00:30:51,720 --> 00:30:53,800
Speaker 1: that that flagpole was on the top of the roof

522
00:30:53,880 --> 00:30:56,440
Speaker 1: of the hotel. So I mean he was up there

523
00:30:56,480 --> 00:30:58,680
Speaker 1: for sure, and if he had something gone wrong, he

524
00:30:58,720 --> 00:31:02,800
Speaker 1: would have that tether probably would not have done terribly much,

525
00:31:04,000 --> 00:31:06,080
Speaker 1: or it would have done a lot to keep his

526
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:08,160
Speaker 1: leg hanging up there, but the rest of him would

527
00:31:08,160 --> 00:31:10,200
Speaker 1: have kept going to the ground. You know, how did

528
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:14,520
Speaker 1: he Uh he had a little contraption for that with

529
00:31:14,560 --> 00:31:18,200
Speaker 1: the tube that went down. But here's the thing. So

530
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:22,280
Speaker 1: you're you're a traveling flagpole sitter. You're relying on the

531
00:31:22,280 --> 00:31:25,160
Speaker 1: help of other people on the ground. You need food.

532
00:31:25,880 --> 00:31:28,640
Speaker 1: You when you pee and poop into that contraption that

533
00:31:28,720 --> 00:31:31,080
Speaker 1: leads to a tube that goes down to the ground,

534
00:31:31,360 --> 00:31:33,720
Speaker 1: you don't want that just leaking out for the spectators

535
00:31:33,720 --> 00:31:36,760
Speaker 1: to see and smell and experience. You needed to go

536
00:31:36,800 --> 00:31:39,280
Speaker 1: into a bucket that somebody's going to go take away

537
00:31:39,280 --> 00:31:42,840
Speaker 1: and dump. So you're relying on this kind of group

538
00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:46,320
Speaker 1: of assistance in hands that probably the promoter maybe helped

539
00:31:46,400 --> 00:31:48,960
Speaker 1: hire for you. Maybe you make a friend along the

540
00:31:49,000 --> 00:31:51,360
Speaker 1: way who just kind of travels from town to town

541
00:31:51,360 --> 00:31:56,680
Speaker 1: with you for a little while, an assistant. He had

542
00:31:56,680 --> 00:32:01,520
Speaker 1: a boy business, right, he had a lad who would

543
00:32:01,520 --> 00:32:06,120
Speaker 1: help him. Yeah, yeah, uh so, uh but it would

544
00:32:06,120 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 1: be a pretty bad job. Yeah. But anyway, so he

545
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:11,160
Speaker 1: had to I mean, he had to eat, and he

546
00:32:11,200 --> 00:32:13,959
Speaker 1: didn't eat much. He would apparently just kind of almost

547
00:32:14,040 --> 00:32:20,120
Speaker 1: do a broth fast um augmented with cigarettes and coffee. Um,

548
00:32:20,160 --> 00:32:22,040
Speaker 1: he would stay up for four days at a time,

549
00:32:22,360 --> 00:32:25,719
Speaker 1: because like, living on a flagpole is not exactly like

550
00:32:25,760 --> 00:32:29,920
Speaker 1: the most comfortable place you can exist for, you know,

551
00:32:30,160 --> 00:32:33,200
Speaker 1: twenty two days or thirteen days or however long. No,

552
00:32:33,680 --> 00:32:37,800
Speaker 1: And it eventually turned against him, and that the money

553
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:41,160
Speaker 1: dried up after he did this sort of big Atlantic

554
00:32:41,160 --> 00:32:44,080
Speaker 1: city stunt that we talked about and it was the

555
00:32:44,080 --> 00:32:47,480
Speaker 1: Great Depression, and eventually people were kind of like, I

556
00:32:47,480 --> 00:32:49,800
Speaker 1: don't really care so much about this dumb stunt because

557
00:32:49,840 --> 00:32:54,200
Speaker 1: I'm starving and I'm broke and I'm homeless, right, And

558
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:57,400
Speaker 1: that the kind of tide of public opinion turned such

559
00:32:57,480 --> 00:33:01,560
Speaker 1: that he went to do this in the Bronx and

560
00:33:01,560 --> 00:33:04,960
Speaker 1: he was actually arrested for public nuisance. Yeah, and I'm

561
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:08,760
Speaker 1: sure he was like, but I'm shipwreck Kelly, right, But

562
00:33:08,840 --> 00:33:10,800
Speaker 1: I mean think about it, that's like everybody's sick of

563
00:33:10,800 --> 00:33:13,400
Speaker 1: you now, Kelly and your stick. We're all just depressed

564
00:33:13,440 --> 00:33:16,720
Speaker 1: in the depression. So maybe we'll do a dance marathon,

565
00:33:16,800 --> 00:33:18,400
Speaker 1: but we're not gonna watch you sit around in a

566
00:33:18,400 --> 00:33:23,240
Speaker 1: flag pole anymore. And um there was a contemporary article

567
00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:25,960
Speaker 1: that was written at the time that said that um

568
00:33:26,080 --> 00:33:29,520
Speaker 1: he he attributed the decline of Flagpole, sitting directly to

569
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:32,360
Speaker 1: the stock market crash, and he said that people didn't

570
00:33:32,360 --> 00:33:36,560
Speaker 1: want to see anything higher than their securities stock securities

571
00:33:36,600 --> 00:33:38,760
Speaker 1: at the time, which we're not very high. So then

572
00:33:38,760 --> 00:33:41,040
Speaker 1: everyone went, that's just not even a joke in good

573
00:33:41,040 --> 00:33:46,360
Speaker 1: taste and he and he punches human familiar in the

574
00:33:46,400 --> 00:33:52,400
Speaker 1: mouth and say, you told me to tell that joke? Man?

575
00:33:52,440 --> 00:33:55,720
Speaker 1: That was Gangbusters, Chuck? Do you watch that? Ship? Got me?

576
00:33:56,680 --> 00:33:59,760
Speaker 1: What we do? What we do in the Shadows. I've

577
00:33:59,760 --> 00:34:02,520
Speaker 1: seen some episodes of it, you know. We were talking

578
00:34:02,520 --> 00:34:05,040
Speaker 1: about it, and one of the p a s I think,

579
00:34:05,240 --> 00:34:08,160
Speaker 1: wrote in to say that they were they were just

580
00:34:08,200 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 1: blown away that we were. We're giving such big ups

581
00:34:11,520 --> 00:34:14,759
Speaker 1: to their show. If you talk to Matt Barry, tell

582
00:34:14,800 --> 00:34:17,040
Speaker 1: him he's a comedy genius. I never heard anything back.

583
00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:23,160
Speaker 1: But oh, have you seen an evening with Beverly luff Lynn? No,

584
00:34:23,480 --> 00:34:26,640
Speaker 1: how do I know that name? So it's a um

585
00:34:27,160 --> 00:34:33,320
Speaker 1: Craig Robinson, Yes, from the office, right, he plays a

586
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:39,880
Speaker 1: guy named Beverly luf Lynn And uh Aubrey Meadows, Audrey

587
00:34:39,960 --> 00:34:47,280
Speaker 1: Meadows Plaza, that's right, man, I'm yeah, um And then uh, okay,

588
00:34:47,320 --> 00:34:52,200
Speaker 1: so she's the main character, Jermaine Clement. I know him

589
00:34:51,440 --> 00:34:55,000
Speaker 1: that he plays well, you just have to see it anyway.

590
00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:56,200
Speaker 1: So what he was and what we do in the

591
00:34:56,239 --> 00:34:59,640
Speaker 1: Shadows the movie right right, So he I think he

592
00:34:59,680 --> 00:35:02,080
Speaker 1: coke eatd it too. This is what all ties into this.

593
00:35:02,800 --> 00:35:05,800
Speaker 1: He and Matt Barry are also in this too. Matt

594
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:07,400
Speaker 1: Berry is in the TV version of what we do

595
00:35:07,440 --> 00:35:10,360
Speaker 1: in the Shadows. The main Clement help help create it.

596
00:35:10,640 --> 00:35:15,160
Speaker 1: But um, it's definitely worth watching. Is purposefully very bizarre,

597
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:19,040
Speaker 1: which can get really annoying really easily, but this movie

598
00:35:19,200 --> 00:35:24,320
Speaker 1: pulls it off very well, like purposeful bizarreness and for humor. Um,

599
00:35:24,400 --> 00:35:27,480
Speaker 1: And it's a good it's a good movie. It's worth watching. Okay,

600
00:35:27,960 --> 00:35:31,400
Speaker 1: it's worth watching. I leave it to you to decide

601
00:35:31,400 --> 00:35:33,040
Speaker 1: whether it's a good movie or not. Well, I love

602
00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:35,719
Speaker 1: everybody in it. That's a great cast. Yeah, I mean

603
00:35:35,760 --> 00:35:38,200
Speaker 1: it's a it's a it's a it's worth watching. How

604
00:35:38,200 --> 00:35:40,680
Speaker 1: about that? All right? Should we take our second break here?

605
00:35:40,760 --> 00:35:44,400
Speaker 1: Can you believe we haven't? Yes? I can. All right,

606
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:47,839
Speaker 1: let's do our other break and then we're gonna talk

607
00:35:47,920 --> 00:35:51,000
Speaker 1: about we're gonna wind up this flagpole sitting thing. Right

608
00:35:51,040 --> 00:36:25,840
Speaker 1: after this Okay, So Kelly, when we left off, the

609
00:36:26,120 --> 00:36:28,520
Speaker 1: public turns on him. They don't care about him anymore.

610
00:36:29,200 --> 00:36:33,400
Speaker 1: He's he's probably drunk in some hotel room somewhere with

611
00:36:33,480 --> 00:36:36,239
Speaker 1: his human familiar talking about the good old days at

612
00:36:36,280 --> 00:36:39,880
Speaker 1: this point, right, Yeah, Yeah, it's kind of sad. I

613
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:43,359
Speaker 1: get the impression, um, that the Memory Palace episode really

614
00:36:43,400 --> 00:36:47,000
Speaker 1: focuses on the sad decline of shipwreck Kelly, because I mean,

615
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:51,120
Speaker 1: he was a celebrity, a national probably international celebrity, for

616
00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:56,000
Speaker 1: like a decade, a decade for sitting on flagpoles, and

617
00:36:56,400 --> 00:36:59,960
Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, he's just done, Like society

618
00:37:00,160 --> 00:37:03,839
Speaker 1: rops him like a hot potato, and he's penniless and

619
00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:08,000
Speaker 1: on public assistance. Basically. Yeah, and he died a very

620
00:37:08,040 --> 00:37:12,480
Speaker 1: sad death he did. Uh. And I think his final

621
00:37:12,800 --> 00:37:15,600
Speaker 1: flagpole sit it was all the way in the nineteen

622
00:37:15,680 --> 00:37:18,840
Speaker 1: fifties and Orange Texas in nineteen fifty two. He was

623
00:37:18,880 --> 00:37:22,800
Speaker 1: almost sixty years old at this point, and he had,

624
00:37:23,320 --> 00:37:29,759
Speaker 1: during the publicity run up to this, had two heart attacks. Um, well,

625
00:37:29,920 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 1: was he sitting on his pole for publicity or was

626
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:34,880
Speaker 1: this part of the pole sitting when he had the

627
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:39,600
Speaker 1: heart attacks? He was? He had the heart attacks on

628
00:37:39,640 --> 00:37:43,080
Speaker 1: the pole during the publicity. Oh so the the actual

629
00:37:43,160 --> 00:37:46,799
Speaker 1: sit was another publicity stunt for some place, right, Yeah,

630
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:49,520
Speaker 1: I don't know what business it was for. I didn't

631
00:37:49,520 --> 00:37:51,799
Speaker 1: see that, but I did see that. The promoters were like,

632
00:37:51,960 --> 00:37:54,839
Speaker 1: come down right now, we we we don't think you're

633
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:58,600
Speaker 1: going to survive a third heart attack, so stop, which

634
00:37:58,640 --> 00:38:02,000
Speaker 1: is crazy. I mean, it's only fifty nine at the time. Yeah,

635
00:38:02,120 --> 00:38:06,839
Speaker 1: but fifty nine in the nineteen fifties, that was when

636
00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:11,320
Speaker 1: your name was shipwreck. Yeah. But he did die of

637
00:38:11,440 --> 00:38:15,399
Speaker 1: that third heart attack like a week after that, right, Yeah,

638
00:38:15,440 --> 00:38:18,600
Speaker 1: he's walking around New York on fifty one Street and

639
00:38:18,760 --> 00:38:22,640
Speaker 1: um he dropped that on the sidewalk from a heart attack.

640
00:38:22,719 --> 00:38:28,319
Speaker 1: And he uh was found holding a scrapbook of all

641
00:38:28,480 --> 00:38:33,200
Speaker 1: like clippings of newspaper articles about him during his heyday.

642
00:38:33,480 --> 00:38:37,279
Speaker 1: Isn't that sad? It's like a movie. Yeah, I can't

643
00:38:37,320 --> 00:38:40,520
Speaker 1: believe this is a movie. He's I mean, he's a

644
00:38:40,640 --> 00:38:48,520
Speaker 1: gold mine just waiting to be well mined. Uh wait, wait, wait,

645
00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:53,880
Speaker 1: there's one other thing about him. After he um was

646
00:38:54,320 --> 00:38:57,160
Speaker 1: done with this flag poles sitting career, the heyday of it.

647
00:38:57,640 --> 00:38:59,520
Speaker 1: He one of the jobs he had was as a

648
00:38:59,640 --> 00:39:04,760
Speaker 1: jiggle oh, a male escort who would dance with whoever

649
00:39:04,800 --> 00:39:08,000
Speaker 1: wanted him to dance at the Roseland ball Room near

650
00:39:08,040 --> 00:39:12,680
Speaker 1: Times Square. He was a private dancer, a dancer for money.

651
00:39:12,840 --> 00:39:16,279
Speaker 1: I've been to roseland they've seen some good shows there. Yeah,

652
00:39:16,320 --> 00:39:19,960
Speaker 1: well you were where Shipwreck Kelly danced for a diamond

653
00:39:20,040 --> 00:39:22,799
Speaker 1: dance because he was a jiggilow. I would have paid

654
00:39:22,840 --> 00:39:29,160
Speaker 1: for that dance. Sure, tell him to sit on my head. Hey,

655
00:39:29,200 --> 00:39:33,680
Speaker 1: he'll do what you want him to do. Oh boy, Um,

656
00:39:33,760 --> 00:39:36,359
Speaker 1: So we looked, or rather you look, because you put

657
00:39:36,400 --> 00:39:40,040
Speaker 1: this one together and you found one death from flagpole sitting.

658
00:39:40,080 --> 00:39:43,320
Speaker 1: Isn't that right? That's all I could turn up. Surely,

659
00:39:43,960 --> 00:39:46,919
Speaker 1: surely there were more, but I could really only find one.

660
00:39:47,200 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 1: And this guy was wonderful in every way. Dick Blandy,

661
00:39:51,440 --> 00:39:55,880
Speaker 1: Dixie Blandy, Richard Dixie d I x I E. Bland

662
00:39:56,160 --> 00:40:02,680
Speaker 1: Dick Dixie Blandy. Sure so, Dixie Blandy. He was a

663
00:40:02,680 --> 00:40:08,120
Speaker 1: flag pole sitter who was contemporaneous to Shipwreck Kelly, a

664
00:40:08,160 --> 00:40:11,440
Speaker 1: little bit like during I. Surely he was directly inspired

665
00:40:11,440 --> 00:40:14,920
Speaker 1: by Shipwreck Kelly. He came along and started in ninety nine,

666
00:40:15,200 --> 00:40:19,279
Speaker 1: which was almost the worst year you could join the

667
00:40:19,280 --> 00:40:23,120
Speaker 1: flagpole sitting movement, because just the next year shipwreck, Kelly

668
00:40:23,160 --> 00:40:27,160
Speaker 1: had his triumphant sit aboard like a or above two.

669
00:40:28,200 --> 00:40:33,560
Speaker 1: What triumphant sat? Yeah, Well it was triumphant for a

670
00:40:33,600 --> 00:40:36,239
Speaker 1: couple of reasons. One it was his longest sit I

671
00:40:36,280 --> 00:40:39,279
Speaker 1: believe twenty two days, twenty three days, something like that.

672
00:40:39,680 --> 00:40:43,279
Speaker 1: And secondly, it's aboard or above um a top a

673
00:40:43,400 --> 00:40:48,200
Speaker 1: two hundred foot flagpole for weeks he sat up there.

674
00:40:48,360 --> 00:40:51,200
Speaker 1: That's triumphant if you ask me. But he did his

675
00:40:51,280 --> 00:40:54,440
Speaker 1: in nineteen thirty and everybody dropped him right after. Dixie

676
00:40:54,440 --> 00:40:59,000
Speaker 1: Blandy just started in nine. But even though people said

677
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:01,720
Speaker 1: flag pole sitting so out, we're not going to bother

678
00:41:01,840 --> 00:41:04,440
Speaker 1: even looking up when we see somebody on a flagpole,

679
00:41:04,600 --> 00:41:07,040
Speaker 1: Dixie Blandy said, you know what, I'm not giving up

680
00:41:07,080 --> 00:41:09,359
Speaker 1: on this. And he continued to make a career out

681
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:13,160
Speaker 1: of it wherever he could, yes, until he died from

682
00:41:13,160 --> 00:41:17,319
Speaker 1: flagpole sitting, and at the age of seventy one in

683
00:41:17,600 --> 00:41:22,400
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, he fell off of his flagpole. It

684
00:41:22,480 --> 00:41:25,799
Speaker 1: was a fifty foot pole And uh, where was this

685
00:41:25,920 --> 00:41:32,120
Speaker 1: in in Harvey? Yeah, I get the impression in Pennsylvania, Harvey, Pennsylvania. Yeah,

686
00:41:32,160 --> 00:41:35,080
Speaker 1: because the article that reported on it as if it

687
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:38,280
Speaker 1: were something of a nearby event was called The Reading Eagle.

688
00:41:39,040 --> 00:41:42,520
Speaker 1: And reading is in Pennsylvania, right, Uh yeah? Is it

689
00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:48,080
Speaker 1: reading whatever? I can't tell you how many times I've

690
00:41:48,120 --> 00:41:51,360
Speaker 1: been told that since I was a child playing monopoly,

691
00:41:51,800 --> 00:41:54,440
Speaker 1: and it's just never stuck for some reason. Was that

692
00:41:54,560 --> 00:42:01,480
Speaker 1: the titular railroad? M okay, well, reading railroad? We said, reading, Yeah,

693
00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:04,120
Speaker 1: that's right, that's what I said too, But apparently he's ready.

694
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:06,319
Speaker 1: Well I don't know. I didn't know. It's the same thing. Um,

695
00:42:06,360 --> 00:42:09,080
Speaker 1: but either way, this is where Harvey and of course

696
00:42:09,160 --> 00:42:11,239
Speaker 1: it's all it's always like the grand opening of a

697
00:42:11,360 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 1: chopping center or something, and that's what was going on.

698
00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:20,080
Speaker 1: Here's a four day promotion and um he basically said,

699
00:42:20,120 --> 00:42:23,319
Speaker 1: I think this pole was attached to a trailer and

700
00:42:23,719 --> 00:42:26,759
Speaker 1: the trailer moved. Is that right? Well, he asked a

701
00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:28,880
Speaker 1: security guard to move the trailers so they can make

702
00:42:28,960 --> 00:42:31,080
Speaker 1: room for what I took to be a cherry picker

703
00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:33,920
Speaker 1: that could go up and get them. This is hours

704
00:42:34,000 --> 00:42:38,480
Speaker 1: before the end of his four day sit and um

705
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:41,120
Speaker 1: when the security guard, I guess who had never tried

706
00:42:41,160 --> 00:42:45,440
Speaker 1: this before, moved the trailer guy wire that was stabilizing

707
00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:48,880
Speaker 1: the pole, became taught and actually pulled the pole, snapped

708
00:42:48,880 --> 00:42:52,319
Speaker 1: the pole in two with Dixie still on top of

709
00:42:52,360 --> 00:42:55,640
Speaker 1: this fifty foot pole, and he landed scoll first, from

710
00:42:55,719 --> 00:42:58,200
Speaker 1: what I can tell, onto the to the asphalt below.

711
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:01,920
Speaker 1: That's not what you want to to open your grocery

712
00:43:01,920 --> 00:43:05,439
Speaker 1: store with no or, or to close your flagpole sit

713
00:43:05,520 --> 00:43:10,399
Speaker 1: with no either way. He it's a bad jam. This

714
00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:12,359
Speaker 1: was not his only accident to this is the one

715
00:43:12,400 --> 00:43:15,240
Speaker 1: that got him, but he had fractured his skull before

716
00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 1: when he was thrown off a pole in a storm

717
00:43:18,160 --> 00:43:22,319
Speaker 1: in n And then there was this is heartwarming. In

718
00:43:23,040 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 1: X one, he was doing a pulse sit for promotion,

719
00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:30,680
Speaker 1: dressed as Santa Claus and he was shouting Merry Christmas.

720
00:43:30,719 --> 00:43:32,120
Speaker 1: That was his job, sit on the top of the

721
00:43:32,120 --> 00:43:35,560
Speaker 1: flag pole and shot Merry Christmas. And apparently it got

722
00:43:35,600 --> 00:43:37,839
Speaker 1: to the point where he finally yelled down that he

723
00:43:37,920 --> 00:43:40,320
Speaker 1: was getting numb and he had to be taken to

724
00:43:40,400 --> 00:43:44,480
Speaker 1: the hospital, which is this is what I'm talking about. Man,

725
00:43:45,239 --> 00:43:48,520
Speaker 1: just no thought. It doesn't take thought to just think

726
00:43:48,560 --> 00:43:54,360
Speaker 1: about flagpole sitting. And I love that about it Yeasry Christmas, Christmas.

727
00:43:54,600 --> 00:43:57,040
Speaker 1: I think I think there's something wrong up here. I

728
00:43:57,080 --> 00:43:59,319
Speaker 1: gotta go to the hospital because I'm sitting on top

729
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:01,960
Speaker 1: of a flagpole Justice Santa Claus shouting Merry Christmas for

730
00:44:02,000 --> 00:44:06,000
Speaker 1: three days and it's December in Pennsylvania. In reading, it's

731
00:44:06,000 --> 00:44:10,480
Speaker 1: reading right. Uh. And this was you know, these were

732
00:44:10,480 --> 00:44:13,040
Speaker 1: definitely the waning days. This was in the nineteen seventies.

733
00:44:13,080 --> 00:44:16,239
Speaker 1: There were some other stunts throughout the years. Here and there.

734
00:44:16,280 --> 00:44:21,120
Speaker 1: A couple got married a top of flagpole. Um, let

735
00:44:21,200 --> 00:44:24,600
Speaker 1: me see here. Seventeen year old in nineteen sixty three

736
00:44:25,040 --> 00:44:28,320
Speaker 1: named Peggy Townsend spent two hundred and seventeen days on

737
00:44:28,360 --> 00:44:32,200
Speaker 1: a pole for a contest for a radio station. And

738
00:44:32,239 --> 00:44:35,440
Speaker 1: then the granddaddy of them all, this guy, Kenneth gedge

739
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:40,760
Speaker 1: ken Gidge two hundred and forty eight days in nineteen

740
00:44:40,800 --> 00:44:43,479
Speaker 1: seventy one. This guy would later on be a state

741
00:44:43,520 --> 00:44:49,040
Speaker 1: rep for New Hampshire. And uh, he I mean reading

742
00:44:49,080 --> 00:44:52,719
Speaker 1: his account, he was he was basically like, it was

743
00:44:52,840 --> 00:44:58,880
Speaker 1: terrible and I hated it. Every He had a parakeet.

744
00:44:58,920 --> 00:45:01,560
Speaker 1: He had his parakeet with him named Nixon, and he

745
00:45:01,600 --> 00:45:04,319
Speaker 1: said that his parakeet came to hate him, like despise him.

746
00:45:04,760 --> 00:45:07,520
Speaker 1: He said he didn't think any animals ever hated somebody

747
00:45:07,560 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 1: more than that parakeet hated him, probably because he made

748
00:45:11,160 --> 00:45:13,680
Speaker 1: him stay up there in this little tiny house. The

749
00:45:13,719 --> 00:45:18,880
Speaker 1: top of fiberglass poles sway back and forth. He couldn't

750
00:45:18,960 --> 00:45:21,560
Speaker 1: lay down straight in it because the pole, so he

751
00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:24,520
Speaker 1: had to lay wrapped around the pole. Um. It sounds

752
00:45:24,560 --> 00:45:27,120
Speaker 1: really horrible and terrible, and he did it to get

753
00:45:27,120 --> 00:45:29,279
Speaker 1: publicity because he was an out of work actor, I

754
00:45:29,280 --> 00:45:32,160
Speaker 1: guess at the time. Yeah, like I said to called

755
00:45:32,239 --> 00:45:34,880
Speaker 1: the thing of house is generous. It's this little you

756
00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:37,759
Speaker 1: can see a picture of it, but it was it

757
00:45:37,840 --> 00:45:39,520
Speaker 1: was some sort of shelter. At least he wasn't just

758
00:45:39,520 --> 00:45:43,000
Speaker 1: sitting like on a bar stool like a shipwreck Kelly

759
00:45:43,040 --> 00:45:46,719
Speaker 1: for two days. But it was bad and he and

760
00:45:47,200 --> 00:45:49,719
Speaker 1: it's just funny reading these quotes from him. He he

761
00:45:49,760 --> 00:45:51,720
Speaker 1: did not have a good time, and he just basically

762
00:45:51,800 --> 00:45:54,640
Speaker 1: kind of talked about how awful it was. Yeah, he said.

763
00:45:54,840 --> 00:45:58,359
Speaker 1: They said that he lost fifteen pounds three inches from

764
00:45:58,360 --> 00:46:00,440
Speaker 1: his waist in thirteen days of sleep, just within the

765
00:46:00,440 --> 00:46:03,720
Speaker 1: first three months, and that when people would come out,

766
00:46:03,800 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 1: like when the weather is nice, people come out and

767
00:46:05,440 --> 00:46:08,040
Speaker 1: shout questions up to him, and he talked to him. Uh,

768
00:46:08,080 --> 00:46:11,080
Speaker 1: and he said the men usually asked, um, if he

769
00:46:11,160 --> 00:46:13,640
Speaker 1: sleeps and how he goes to the bathroom, and then

770
00:46:13,719 --> 00:46:17,000
Speaker 1: women asked if he was lonely, which I find very sweet.

771
00:46:17,400 --> 00:46:20,640
Speaker 1: But um, I mean, remember we started out here at

772
00:46:20,719 --> 00:46:23,399
Speaker 1: thirteen hours is what kicked this off. And this guy,

773
00:46:23,560 --> 00:46:27,399
Speaker 1: Kenneth Gidge has has brought it up to two forty

774
00:46:27,440 --> 00:46:31,080
Speaker 1: eight days. But Chuck, that does not seem to be

775
00:46:31,120 --> 00:46:34,320
Speaker 1: the record any longer. In fact, the record may never

776
00:46:34,520 --> 00:46:38,920
Speaker 1: be broken. Ever. What do you think? Yeah, h David

777
00:46:39,040 --> 00:46:44,760
Speaker 1: Werder of Wiki Watchee, Florida, Man, this is unbelievable. Sat

778
00:46:44,880 --> 00:46:51,040
Speaker 1: for four hundred and thirty nine days, eleven hours, six minutes. Yeah,

779
00:46:51,360 --> 00:46:57,640
Speaker 1: his sit went from two to night. That's amazing. Yeah.

780
00:46:57,719 --> 00:47:00,279
Speaker 1: And it was outside of an appliance center in clear Water.

781
00:47:00,800 --> 00:47:04,120
Speaker 1: And he didn't do this as like a publicity stunt

782
00:47:04,160 --> 00:47:07,280
Speaker 1: for that appliance center. He did it to protest gas

783
00:47:07,360 --> 00:47:10,399
Speaker 1: prices at the time. Yeah, that's how you see these

784
00:47:10,840 --> 00:47:15,200
Speaker 1: these days sometimes his protests, sure, but the gas at

785
00:47:15,200 --> 00:47:17,719
Speaker 1: the time was nine cents a gallon. That's cute. So

786
00:47:17,760 --> 00:47:21,399
Speaker 1: his protest didn't work at all. But he spent four

787
00:47:21,480 --> 00:47:23,880
Speaker 1: hundred and thirty nine days of his life on a

788
00:47:23,880 --> 00:47:26,480
Speaker 1: flag pole because it was mad about the price of gas.

789
00:47:27,160 --> 00:47:33,400
Speaker 1: No thought whatsoever to a zen like beautiful state. Is

790
00:47:33,440 --> 00:47:36,879
Speaker 1: what this man achieved? Is that the overarching theme? Yep,

791
00:47:37,120 --> 00:47:40,680
Speaker 1: I think so man? Alrighty, you got anything else? Uh? Yeah,

792
00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:42,920
Speaker 1: I mean we we should mention David Blaine. He very

793
00:47:42,960 --> 00:47:49,600
Speaker 1: famously did this standing in two thousand two. Remember that

794
00:47:49,719 --> 00:47:51,480
Speaker 1: for how long? No? I don't remember that at all.

795
00:47:51,520 --> 00:47:54,720
Speaker 1: He stood atop of ninety ft pole for thirty five

796
00:47:54,840 --> 00:47:58,040
Speaker 1: hours in Bryant Park in New York. And this is

797
00:47:58,040 --> 00:48:01,040
Speaker 1: when he was doing those Uh. I'd love the guy

798
00:48:01,040 --> 00:48:03,880
Speaker 1: as the street magician and give me a little levitation trick.

799
00:48:04,000 --> 00:48:07,200
Speaker 1: But when he was like I'm gonna hold my breath

800
00:48:07,280 --> 00:48:09,319
Speaker 1: or I'm gonna be encased in ice or stand on

801
00:48:09,360 --> 00:48:13,040
Speaker 1: this thing, that's when I lost interest. Oh yeah, yeah,

802
00:48:13,120 --> 00:48:15,760
Speaker 1: I like street magic too. It's pretty great stuff. Yeah,

803
00:48:15,800 --> 00:48:19,439
Speaker 1: but yeah he stood. It's tough to stand. I mean,

804
00:48:19,560 --> 00:48:23,919
Speaker 1: sitting is is hard, but standing as a whole different deal. Yeah,

805
00:48:23,960 --> 00:48:28,080
Speaker 1: for sure. I wouldn't want to do it. Nope, So

806
00:48:28,440 --> 00:48:32,799
Speaker 1: you got anything else about flagpoles? Sitting? I don't well

807
00:48:32,840 --> 00:48:36,799
Speaker 1: then chuck. That means, of course, it's time for listener mail.

808
00:48:39,239 --> 00:48:43,160
Speaker 1: This is Oh, this is just funny. Remember in the

809
00:48:43,440 --> 00:48:47,879
Speaker 1: Brockism I talked about my doctor Tuggle. Uh, this comes

810
00:48:47,920 --> 00:48:52,000
Speaker 1: from Joe and Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. He said, Hey, guys, thanks

811
00:48:52,040 --> 00:48:55,000
Speaker 1: for you the entertainment knowledge. Your discussion of doctor names

812
00:48:55,520 --> 00:48:57,440
Speaker 1: at the end of the Brocksis and podcast reminded me

813
00:48:57,480 --> 00:49:00,279
Speaker 1: of two anecdotes. My ex wife had a dentist in

814
00:49:00,320 --> 00:49:06,560
Speaker 1: San Francisco named Dr Drilling. No pretty good, huh sure,

815
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:10,440
Speaker 1: and this is even better, he said. Second, this one

816
00:49:10,719 --> 00:49:13,000
Speaker 1: never gets appreciated as much by others for some reason.

817
00:49:13,040 --> 00:49:15,120
Speaker 1: It must she just hit me the right way. But

818
00:49:15,160 --> 00:49:17,520
Speaker 1: I'm with you, Joe, it hits me too. She worked

819
00:49:17,520 --> 00:49:21,360
Speaker 1: with a medical worked in medical administration, and her boss

820
00:49:21,400 --> 00:49:26,880
Speaker 1: at one point was named Dr Walked w A c

821
00:49:27,239 --> 00:49:30,480
Speaker 1: h t e R pronounced Walked, and he said I

822
00:49:30,480 --> 00:49:34,719
Speaker 1: could just imagine her submitting daily reports using baby talk,

823
00:49:34,760 --> 00:49:40,760
Speaker 1: going here, Dr Walked, here your robots for the day. Man,

824
00:49:40,920 --> 00:49:43,840
Speaker 1: this guy is our new mascot here on the show.

825
00:49:44,000 --> 00:49:46,040
Speaker 1: I think we need to actually get him on here.

826
00:49:46,080 --> 00:49:49,879
Speaker 1: What's his name? Joe and Gettysburg, I love it. Yeah, Joe,

827
00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:52,120
Speaker 1: way to go. This is one of the best listener

828
00:49:52,200 --> 00:49:56,319
Speaker 1: mails I think I've ever heard, Chuck dr walked Um. Well,

829
00:49:56,360 --> 00:49:58,200
Speaker 1: if you want to be like Joe and try to

830
00:49:58,200 --> 00:50:02,120
Speaker 1: topple his record as the eightist email listener mail writer

831
00:50:02,200 --> 00:50:06,000
Speaker 1: of all time, um, let's take your best shot. You

832
00:50:06,080 --> 00:50:08,440
Speaker 1: can wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, running

833
00:50:08,480 --> 00:50:11,160
Speaker 1: up the flag pole, and see who salutes it at

834
00:50:11,320 --> 00:50:17,919
Speaker 1: stuffed podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should

835
00:50:17,960 --> 00:50:20,440
Speaker 1: Know is a production of iHeart Radios How Stuff Works.

836
00:50:20,480 --> 00:50:22,720
Speaker 1: For more podcasts. For my heart Radio, visit the iHeart

837
00:50:22,760 --> 00:50:25,279
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your

838
00:50:25,320 --> 00:50:29,160
Speaker 1: favorite shows. H