Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales are
Speaker 1: right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. William Kent was a
Speaker 1: humble innkeeper in mid seventeen hundreds, England. During the many
Speaker 1: months when he and his wife Elizabeth were expecting the
Speaker 1: birth of their first child, the woman's sister Fanny came
Speaker 1: to stay with them and help around the house. Sadly,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth died giving birth to their son, and the frail
Speaker 1: little infant passed away a short while later. William was
Speaker 1: in turmoil, having lost both his beloved wife and his
Speaker 1: newborn son just days apart. Fanny decided to stay and
Speaker 1: help him, and eventually the two fell in love. He
Speaker 1: wanted to marry her, so he set out for London
Speaker 1: to seek counsel on how to proceed, but there was
Speaker 1: a problem. The Church wouldn't let William mary Fanny, as
Speaker 1: canon law forbade it. William was again heartbroken and decided
Speaker 1: to get away from his job, from his old house,
Speaker 1: from every bad memory he had. He and Fanny parted ways,
Speaker 1: and then he moved to London, where he started a
Speaker 1: new life for himself. Fanny, however, couldn't forget William. She
Speaker 1: wrote him letter as professing her love for him, and
Speaker 1: he wrote back each and every time. Eventually, William could
Speaker 1: no longer hide his feelings and he invited her to
Speaker 1: come stay with him. The two lived secretly as husband
Speaker 1: and wife. They moved to a property on Cock Lane,
Speaker 1: just outside of London, which was owned by a man
Speaker 1: named Richard Parsons. Parsons was a parish clerk who owed
Speaker 1: William a debt for a loan given to him some
Speaker 1: time earlier. But there was something about the couple that
Speaker 1: didn't sit well with Parsons. Some believe that Fanny's family
Speaker 1: had reached out to him and let him in on
Speaker 1: their little secret because they were upset about their daughter's behavior.
Speaker 1: Whatever the source of information that led him to the truth,
Speaker 1: he used canon law as justification to simply not repay William.
Speaker 1: One day, William was called away to a wedding out
Speaker 1: of town, leaving an now pregnant Fanny alone. To make
Speaker 1: sure she was watched over while he was gone, he
Speaker 1: asked Parson's daughter Elizabeth to stay with her, sleeping in
Speaker 1: the same bed, just in case something went wrong with
Speaker 1: the baby. Mr Parsons agreed to the arrangement too, and
Speaker 1: then William left and that was when the scratching started.
Speaker 1: It occurred at different parts of the day and night
Speaker 1: around the home, often paired with a knocking sound. Parsons
Speaker 1: daughter Elizabeth said that a cobbler worked by and that
Speaker 1: was probably what they'd heard. But when the sounds resurfaced
Speaker 1: the following Sunday, a day of rest for many tradesmen,
Speaker 1: they knew something was wrong. Another local landlord came to
Speaker 1: inspect the house and claimed to witness a glowing white
Speaker 1: spirit climbing the stairs. Richard Parsons confirmed that he had
Speaker 1: also seen this same thing. When William returned home, he
Speaker 1: moved Fanny out, not just because of the ghost, but
Speaker 1: also because of her pregnancy. She was only a few
Speaker 1: weeks away from giving birth and he had a comfortable
Speaker 1: place ready for her to deliver in. Unfortunately, tragedy would
Speaker 1: strike once again. Fanny contracted smallpox, and after several days
Speaker 1: of fever, she passed away. William inherited her small estate
Speaker 1: and used the money to pay for her burial costs,
Speaker 1: leaving him with very little leftover. Still, he didn't stay
Speaker 1: down for long. He eventually remarried and became a successful stockbroker.
Speaker 1: With his new status and happy family, he returned to
Speaker 1: cock Lane, taking over for the previous tenant, who had
Speaker 1: left after the scratching and knocking noises became too much
Speaker 1: to bear. Richard Parsons eventually discovered the cause. His daughter
Speaker 1: Elizabeth claimed the ghost had returned, but now there were two,
Speaker 1: not one. The first ghost, which had bothered Fanny prior
Speaker 1: to her death, was thought to be her deceased sister,
Speaker 1: also confusingly named Elizabeth, and this new ghost why it
Speaker 1: was Fanny herself? Of course, Parsons believed they had important
Speaker 1: messages to share, and that's why they refused to move on.
Speaker 1: Fanny's sister. Elizabeth's presence was meant to be a warning
Speaker 1: to her sister about her coming death. Fanny, however, bore
Speaker 1: more shocking news. Her spirit, communicating yes and no through
Speaker 1: a series of knocks, let the Parsons know the secret
Speaker 1: about her widow or husband, William, that he had murdered her,
Speaker 1: possibly both of them. William had allegedly poisoned Fanny with
Speaker 1: arsenic before she could have the baby and then had
Speaker 1: her buried quickly to hide the evidence. The church believed
Speaker 1: the ghosts were telling the truth, after all, how could
Speaker 1: you argue with the spirit. As a result, William soon
Speaker 1: became a prime suspect in the murder of Fanny. Desperate
Speaker 1: to clear his name, he asked for a seance to
Speaker 1: be held in the home so that he could ask
Speaker 1: her himself. Upstairs, Richard Parson's daughter and her sister were
Speaker 1: sleeping while William, Richard, several others in the community gathered
Speaker 1: around the table. They asked the spirit questions about her
Speaker 1: marriage to William and whether he'd poisoned her. One knock
Speaker 1: meant yes, Two knocks meant no. Had they been married?
Speaker 1: Two knocks? Had he poisoned her? One knock? Things weren't
Speaker 1: looking good for poor Mr Kent, But there was something
Speaker 1: about the ghosts that struck everyone as odd. She seemed
Speaker 1: to go wherever Elizabeth Parsons went. While Elizabeth was staying
Speaker 1: in another person's home, knocking sounds were reportedly heard throughout
Speaker 1: the night there. When she returned to her home just
Speaker 1: in time for another seance, though so did the noise.
Speaker 1: An investigation was conducted, as were several more seances, and
Speaker 1: present for all of them in some part of the
Speaker 1: house was Elizabeth Parsons. One night, the investigators asked her
Speaker 1: to sleep with her arms outstretched, her hands outside the bed.
Speaker 1: No scratching or knocking were heard that night, not a
Speaker 1: single sound. The experiment was repeated the next night and
Speaker 1: the same results happened, absolutely nothing. The truth was finally
Speaker 1: exposed when Elizabeth's maids noticed the small plank of wood
Speaker 1: she kept tucked into her clothes. They alerted investigators right away. Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: it seems, had been the ghost the entire time, knocking
Speaker 1: and scratching with the block of wood. But why well,
Speaker 1: because her father had put her up to it. He
Speaker 1: still owed William Kent money for the loan he'd taken,
Speaker 1: and he didn't want to pay it back. After Fanny died,
Speaker 1: William had sued him for the remaining money, so Parsons
Speaker 1: exacted his revenge the only way he knew how, by
Speaker 1: pretending to be a ghost and framing the man for murder.
Speaker 1: His Scooby Doo style plan didn't work, though, After a
Speaker 1: quick trial, Richard and his wife were ordered to pay
Speaker 1: hundreds of pounds in damages to William and Richard was
Speaker 1: also sentenced to prison. In the end, the lesson is
Speaker 1: obvious and simple. If you plan to skip out on
Speaker 1: your debts, you better have a really good plan, a
Speaker 1: lot of luck, and just in case things go south,
Speaker 1: you better knock on wood. Everyone has their vices. Some
Speaker 1: enjoy playing the lottery, others love a good chocolate bar.
Speaker 1: For Antonio Magliavecki, his vice was knowledge. Born in Florence, Italy,
Speaker 1: in three Antonio apprenticed for a local goldsmith until he
Speaker 1: was forty years old. It was then when he met
Speaker 1: Michel Ermini, the librarian for Cardinal de Vedici. Michelle saw
Speaker 1: something in Antonio, a passion for learning, a desire to
Speaker 1: rise above his status as an apprentice and do more
Speaker 1: with the mind he was given. With Michelle's help, Antonio
Speaker 1: learned several languages, including Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. Years later,
Speaker 1: after decades of study, Antonio found himself in the same
Speaker 1: position as his one time tutor, becoming the librarian to
Speaker 1: the Grand Duke of Tuscany. From there, his reputation stretched
Speaker 1: far beyond the confines of his bookshelves. He became an
Speaker 1: academic celebrity of sorts, engaging with scholars from all over
Speaker 1: the world who wanted to learn more about the self
Speaker 1: taught genius from Florence. However, genius often breeds other problems
Speaker 1: for all his intelligence, and Tonio was quite negligent about
Speaker 1: his state of dress. He tended to wear his clothes
Speaker 1: until they were literally falling off of him in tatters.
Speaker 1: He typically only ate three hard boiled eggs for dinner
Speaker 1: with the glass of water, and as someone came to
Speaker 1: his door who he didn't care to entertain, he simply
Speaker 1: wouldn't let them in. He was an incredibly private man,
Speaker 1: devoid of pride or extravagance. He once worked for an
Speaker 1: entire year without taking a salary. In fact, the concept
Speaker 1: of money or bills just didn't occur to him, allowing
Speaker 1: him to amass quite a fortune, But he didn't really
Speaker 1: ended on anything, well almost Antonio enjoyed spending what money
Speaker 1: he had on his greatest obsession, books. He was known
Speaker 1: as a literary glutton, filling his work library with over
Speaker 1: forty thousand titles and more than ten thousand manuscripts. His
Speaker 1: home also held thousands of volumes, many of which lined
Speaker 1: the staircases and extended outside the house onto his porch.
Speaker 1: Even more impressive was the fact that he had read
Speaker 1: every single one of them. As someone whose side table
Speaker 1: practically groans under the weight of all the new books
Speaker 1: that I want to read, I can't help but be
Speaker 1: a little jealous. Clearly, Antonio dedicated his life to expanding
Speaker 1: his mind with a written word. Perhaps all of that
Speaker 1: reading had a profound effect on him, or maybe his
Speaker 1: brain had always been wired a certain way. But aside
Speaker 1: from his extensive library, Antonio was also known for his
Speaker 1: extensive memory. Today, he might be called a human search engine,
Speaker 1: capable of citing the exact book, author, and even pay
Speaker 1: age number when asked of him. According to the stories,
Speaker 1: he was once asked by his employer, the Duke, where
Speaker 1: he might find a specific title without hesitation, Antonio told
Speaker 1: him there was only one copy of it in existence.
Speaker 1: Arrested in the Grand Seignior's library in Constantinople, on the
Speaker 1: second bookcase from the right, eleven volumes in it said
Speaker 1: that a priest asking for a eulogy on a certain
Speaker 1: saint would often get a list of over a hundred
Speaker 1: authors who had ever written about that saint and where
Speaker 1: their books could be found amongst the many thousands of
Speaker 1: books in his possession. But all that book knowledge came
Speaker 1: at a price. Antonio almost never traveled outside of Florence
Speaker 1: to see the world. He slept in his clothes, rarely
Speaker 1: ate anything other than those hard boiled eggs, and spent
Speaker 1: hours each day reading in the palace library. And yet
Speaker 1: he lived to be eighty one years old and was
Speaker 1: revered for his sharp mind and endless memory. For him,
Speaker 1: a work life balance just didn't exist, because his work
Speaker 1: was his life. When he died, Antonio left his entire
Speaker 1: fortune to the poor. His library, though tens of thousands
Speaker 1: of books, all went to the Grand Duke, but with
Speaker 1: one condition that they'd be used to found a public library.
Speaker 1: It was called the Magliabechiana, and through various mergers with
Speaker 1: other private libraries around Italy, it went on to become
Speaker 1: the National Central Library of Florence, the largest public library
Speaker 1: in all of Italy. Antonio didn't just believe in learning.
Speaker 1: He believed that knowledge was meant to be shared with everyone.
Speaker 1: If he were alive today, he'd be amazed at how
Speaker 1: easy the Internet has made that dream come true. Either
Speaker 1: that or he'd spend his entire life online reading everything
Speaker 1: he could get his hands on. I'd expect nothing less
Speaker 1: from the world's most ravenous bookworm. I hope you've enjoyed
Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for
Speaker 1: free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show
Speaker 1: by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created
Speaker 1: by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.
Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can
Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the World of Lore
Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious.