Speaker 1: Welcomed Aaron Manky's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is full
Speaker 1: of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. While it might define logic, oftentimes the surest
Speaker 1: path to military victory is the least obvious one, and
Speaker 1: sometimes that path isn't even on the battlefield. Knowing the
Speaker 1: odds were stacked against the American colonies and the Revolutionary War,
Speaker 1: George Washington and Benjamin Talmidge relied on another facet of
Speaker 1: war to try to turn the odds in their favor, espionage.
Speaker 1: In fact, they created an entire spiring. It may well
Speaker 1: have won the war for them, and from seventeen seventy
Speaker 1: eight to seventeen eighty this spir ring was instrumental in
Speaker 1: keeping Americans in control of their own destiny, known as
Speaker 1: the Culper Ring. This approach was so secret that George
Speaker 1: Washington himself ordered Talmadge to keep him in the dark
Speaker 1: as to who the actual operatives were, all the better
Speaker 1: to protect their identities. Of course, thanks to the Culper Codebook,
Speaker 1: historians have since been able to decipher the messages that
Speaker 1: were sent between various parties involving and keeping American intelligence
Speaker 1: a few steps ahead of the British Army. It used
Speaker 1: a numerical code system for common words, and once those
Speaker 1: numbers were cracked, the story unfolded. For instance, seven to
Speaker 1: seven referred to New York City, two to three meant gold,
Speaker 1: and three five five meant lady. But three fifty five
Speaker 1: may have meant much more than that. It may well
Speaker 1: have referred to one specific lady, a lady who was
Speaker 1: herself an American spy. It wouldn't be the first time
Speaker 1: a woman had been overlooked by the enemy. Take, for instance,
Speaker 1: a major leak sprung by British Major John Andre while
Speaker 1: speaking of an impending attack on the Americans. Andre didn't
Speaker 1: think twice about speaking freely in front of a housewife
Speaker 1: named Lydia Dara, who listened intently and then relay the
Speaker 1: news to George Washington. Andrea interrogated everyone in the house
Speaker 1: after the leak came to light, everyone that is, except Lydia.
Speaker 1: After all, surely all women held the same beliefs as
Speaker 1: their husbands right. The lady of the Culbra ring, though
Speaker 1: this Agent three is still unknown to this day, but
Speaker 1: it's believed that she was a member of a high
Speaker 1: ranking loyalist family in New York City, a hotbed of
Speaker 1: British activity during the war. There she would have had
Speaker 1: access to all the chatter of British nobility in the colonies.
Speaker 1: And that's when the biggest intelligence breakthrough of the war surfaced,
Speaker 1: thanks largely to the efforts of three fifty five, ever
Speaker 1: overlooked in the company of her enemy, you see, will
Speaker 1: reports right up with the British in the South. On
Speaker 1: their return to New York City, the reports began coming
Speaker 1: from an unnamed operative in the field. These reports claimed
Speaker 1: that an American general was in cahoots with the British
Speaker 1: and covering for Major John Andrea's comings and goings, and
Speaker 1: the intelligence was clear about who that was. Benedict Arnold
Speaker 1: was a traitor to the revolutionary cause, and this revelation
Speaker 1: came by most accounts from Agent threeft. After all, most
Speaker 1: other Culpra spies had already fled New York City by
Speaker 1: that point, avoiding the heat from British counter intelligence. Yet
Speaker 1: This breakthrough finding led to the arrest and execution of
Speaker 1: Major John andre And, while Benedict Arnold escaped. The turning
Speaker 1: point had well turned. In the aftermath of this massive
Speaker 1: plot unraveling, the British began sweeping up anyone they even
Speaker 1: remotely suspected. According to some reports, this may have included
Speaker 1: Agent three fifty five, who was held aboard the prison
Speaker 1: ship the HMS Jersey. There she gave birth to a
Speaker 1: son and soon died amidst horrid conditions. Correspondence among the
Speaker 1: Copra spy ring largely dried up after her death, leading
Speaker 1: more credibility to the belief that it was the still
Speaker 1: anonymous Agent three who was at the heart of it all.
Speaker 1: Robert Townsend, the head of the Culpa ring at the time,
Speaker 1: fell into a depression. Rumor has it that he was
Speaker 1: romantically involved with Agent three, although with all the secrecy
Speaker 1: surrounding their group, it isn't likely that we could ever
Speaker 1: prove that. Whatever the case, Agent three and her fellow
Speaker 1: spies learned a valuable lesson during their service. You never
Speaker 1: know what you might hear when people think no one
Speaker 1: is listening, whether it's searching the ocean's depths, or climbing
Speaker 1: the tallest mountains. There are certain individuals who feel an urge,
Speaker 1: a hung to push themselves to the extreme. They aren't
Speaker 1: satisfied behind a desk or standing on the sidelines. They
Speaker 1: feel a calling to challenge what's possible by accomplishing the impossible.
Speaker 1: Perhaps none more than Donald Campbell. Campbell was born in Surrey, England,
Speaker 1: on March twenty three, nineteen twenty one, to a speed
Speaker 1: demon of a father, Sir Malcolm Campbell, had been a
Speaker 1: Grand Prix racer and speed record holder on both water
Speaker 1: and land. It seems his son was destined to follow
Speaker 1: in his footsteps. Instead, Donald tried to join the Air
Speaker 1: Force at the start of World War Two, but was
Speaker 1: denied entry due to about of rheumatic fever when he
Speaker 1: was younger. Instead, he supported the war effort by working
Speaker 1: as an engineer on military vehicles. After the war was over,
Speaker 1: a New Year's Eve of nineteen forty eight, Campbell's life
Speaker 1: took a drastic turn. His father suffered a series of
Speaker 1: strokes and passed away unexpectedly. He was only sixty three
Speaker 1: at the time, still relatively young, but he'd led a
Speaker 1: much longer life than most others in his line of work.
Speaker 1: After his father's death, Donald joined up with his father's
Speaker 1: chief engineer, Leo Villa, and the two continued Sir Malcolm's
Speaker 1: work in setting speed records on land and water. Campbell
Speaker 1: started in nineteen forty nine by racing his father's old powerboat,
Speaker 1: the Bluebird K four. The K four was a hydroplane
Speaker 1: which would glide across the water once it reached top speeds,
Speaker 1: and as American racers started beating his father's existing records,
Speaker 1: Campbell knew that he'd have to make some changes if
Speaker 1: he hoped to compete, So he modified the K for
Speaker 1: to reduce drag on the water, and in nineteen fifty
Speaker 1: one he managed to reach one hundred seventy miles per hour.
Speaker 1: If only his success had lasted on one unfortunate attempt
Speaker 1: to break the record, The Bluebird K four was destroyed,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't long before another racer had moved the
Speaker 1: record up again. Campbell now had to beat one hundred
Speaker 1: seventy eight miles per hour. He and Leo got to
Speaker 1: work on a new Bluebird, one made of metal and
Speaker 1: powered by a jet engine. Dubbed the Case seven. His
Speaker 1: new hydroplane proved to be a roaring success. Between nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty five and nineteen sixty four, Campbell set a whopping
Speaker 1: seven world records and reached speeds as high as two
Speaker 1: hundred and eighty six miles per hour. Now, he might
Speaker 1: have had one eye on the water, but he also
Speaker 1: had his other eye back on land. Several years earlier,
Speaker 1: a racer named John Cobb had set a land speed
Speaker 1: record of three hundred and ninety four miles per hour,
Speaker 1: and Campbell was determined to beat it. He had a
Speaker 1: new vehicle design called the Bluebird Proteus c N seven. Naturally,
Speaker 1: it was blue colored, and in order to achieve speeds
Speaker 1: as high as five hundred miles per hour, it was
Speaker 1: shaped like a flattened submarine. It was his pride and joy,
Speaker 1: a testament to British engineering, and the thing that would
Speaker 1: zoom him out from behind his father's shadow. Campbell ran
Speaker 1: some low speed tests in Sussex before transporting the c
Speaker 1: N seven to the salt flats of Utah, where it
Speaker 1: would really stretch its legs. But it was on the
Speaker 1: sixth attempt when the car stretched a little too far
Speaker 1: and crashed after reaching a blistering three hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: miles per hour. Campbell survived with a fractured skull and
Speaker 1: some bumps and scrapes, but the c N seven was totaled.
Speaker 1: A new vehicle was built and in July of nineteen
Speaker 1: four Donald headed to Australia where he set a new
Speaker 1: record of four hundred and three point one miles per hour.
Speaker 1: It was arousing success and well deserved after so many
Speaker 1: failed attempts, but he still wanted to push things further,
Speaker 1: and to do that he had to build a car
Speaker 1: with a different kind of propulsion. Enter the Bluebird Mock
Speaker 1: one point one, otherwise known as the rocket car. It
Speaker 1: was designed to reach a top speed of eight hundred
Speaker 1: and forty miles per hour with the help of two
Speaker 1: Bristol Siddeley rocket engines. Just building the car and telling
Speaker 1: people about it wasn't enough. He wanted to get the
Speaker 1: word out by setting another record With the Bluebird Case seven,
Speaker 1: he put in a Bristol Orpheus jet engine capable of
Speaker 1: delivering forty pounds of thrust. After about of bad weather
Speaker 1: and some unsuccessful tries in Lancashire, Campbell finally got his opportunity.
Speaker 1: On January worth of ninety seven. He brought the Case
Speaker 1: seven out to the middle of the lake and aimed
Speaker 1: it towards the southern end. The engine fired and the
Speaker 1: Bluebird took off like well a rocket seventy three ten.
Speaker 1: Campbell couldn't be stopped. Literally. The first run had gone well,
Speaker 1: and he wanted to go again, immediately, refusing to refuel
Speaker 1: or wait for things to cool down. The Bluebird blazed
Speaker 1: a trail across the water a second time, heating upwards
Speaker 1: of three hundred and twenty miles per hour. But something
Speaker 1: was wrong. The engine went out on this run, and
Speaker 1: the vehicle touched down on the water, nose pointed downward,
Speaker 1: and went into a full sumersault. The Case seven broke
Speaker 1: apart as it skipped along the surface of the water.
Speaker 1: Campbell was killed in the incident, and his body was lost.
Speaker 1: It took thirty years for divers to find and recover
Speaker 1: both the Bluebird and Campbell's remains from the lake. He
Speaker 1: was still wearing his coveralls. Donald Campbell set out to
Speaker 1: prove he was as brave and as daring as his
Speaker 1: father before him, and he did. Sadly, he led his
Speaker 1: success cloud his judgment, and he paid the ultimate price
Speaker 1: for it. Sometimes when you feel the need for speed,
Speaker 1: that's when you should stop and smell the roses before
Speaker 1: they're left on your grave. I hope you've enjoyed today's
Speaker 1: guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free
Speaker 1: on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by
Speaker 1: visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by
Speaker 1: me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I
Speaker 1: make another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast,
Speaker 1: book series, and television show, and you can learn all
Speaker 1: about it over at the World of Lore dot com.
Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious.