1
00:00:04,080 --> 00:00:07,440
Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Nke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of

2
00:00:07,480 --> 00:00:14,440
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of

3
00:00:14,480 --> 00:00:18,440
Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all

4
00:00:18,480 --> 00:00:22,159
Speaker 1: of these amazing tales are right there on display, just

5
00:00:22,200 --> 00:00:28,880
Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.

6
00:00:36,520 --> 00:00:39,479
Speaker 1: In the nineteen sixties and seventies, the US and the

7
00:00:39,479 --> 00:00:43,240
Speaker 1: Soviet Union were in a race for control, for nuclear power,

8
00:00:43,400 --> 00:00:47,120
Speaker 1: for outer space, and of course for our minds. But

9
00:00:47,240 --> 00:00:51,080
Speaker 1: I'm not talking about propaganda or even ideology. I'm talking

10
00:00:51,120 --> 00:00:54,760
Speaker 1: about how in nineteen seventy one lone housewife in Russia

11
00:00:54,960 --> 00:00:57,520
Speaker 1: set off a new type of Cold War where two

12
00:00:57,600 --> 00:01:02,760
Speaker 1: world powers tried to create weapons of psychic destruction. Sometime

13
00:01:02,800 --> 00:01:05,679
Speaker 1: in the early nineteen seventies, tapes smuggled out of the

14
00:01:05,680 --> 00:01:09,000
Speaker 1: Soviet Union made their way to the CIA. One video,

15
00:01:09,120 --> 00:01:12,320
Speaker 1: recorded on March tenth of nineteen seventy quickly became an

16
00:01:12,360 --> 00:01:16,240
Speaker 1: object of fascination to the agency. The tape showed forty

17
00:01:16,240 --> 00:01:19,600
Speaker 1: four year old Nina Cooliina, a housewife and former Red

18
00:01:19,720 --> 00:01:23,920
Speaker 1: Army soldier, in an observation room somewhere in Leningrad. Sitting

19
00:01:23,959 --> 00:01:26,119
Speaker 1: in front of her on a table was a tiny,

20
00:01:26,360 --> 00:01:29,200
Speaker 1: still beating heart. The heart had been taken from a

21
00:01:29,200 --> 00:01:32,319
Speaker 1: frog just minutes before and placed in a solution that

22
00:01:32,319 --> 00:01:34,120
Speaker 1: would allow it to keep beating for up to an

23
00:01:34,120 --> 00:01:37,600
Speaker 1: hour after death. Both Nina and the tiny heart were

24
00:01:37,640 --> 00:01:41,360
Speaker 1: wired with electrodes which recorded their heart rates. As CIA

25
00:01:41,440 --> 00:01:44,520
Speaker 1: analysts watched the small, dark haired woman on the tape

26
00:01:44,680 --> 00:01:48,280
Speaker 1: focused intently, to their amazement, the frog heart began to

27
00:01:48,320 --> 00:01:52,040
Speaker 1: beat faster. Nina screwed up her face in concentration again,

28
00:01:52,360 --> 00:01:55,360
Speaker 1: and the frog heart beat slowed, and finally, after a

29
00:01:55,360 --> 00:01:58,559
Speaker 1: few minutes, Nina focused one last time, and right before

30
00:01:58,600 --> 00:02:02,000
Speaker 1: the analyst's eyes, through the power of thought alone, she

31
00:02:02,120 --> 00:02:05,760
Speaker 1: stopped the frog heart cold. Dozens of tapes trickled in

32
00:02:05,800 --> 00:02:09,400
Speaker 1: from across the Iron Curtain, showing Nina moving matchsticks across

33
00:02:09,400 --> 00:02:12,640
Speaker 1: a table with her mind, separating egg whites from yokes,

34
00:02:12,840 --> 00:02:17,480
Speaker 1: even accelerating a researcher's heartbeat to dangerous levels. And needless

35
00:02:17,480 --> 00:02:19,880
Speaker 1: to say, the CIA was shocked. It seemed that the

36
00:02:19,880 --> 00:02:24,760
Speaker 1: Soviets had found someone who could master ESP or extrasensory perception.

37
00:02:25,400 --> 00:02:28,839
Speaker 1: You see for decades, researchers at the fringes of respectable

38
00:02:28,880 --> 00:02:33,040
Speaker 1: science had been looking into the world of ESP. Psychical researchers,

39
00:02:33,080 --> 00:02:36,200
Speaker 1: as they called themselves, were bent on discovering whether humans

40
00:02:36,200 --> 00:02:40,320
Speaker 1: could do extraordinary things with psychic energy, such as reading

41
00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:43,760
Speaker 1: another person's thoughts, viewing a place halfway around the world,

42
00:02:44,120 --> 00:02:47,440
Speaker 1: or even moving objects with their minds. With the discovery

43
00:02:47,480 --> 00:02:51,120
Speaker 1: of Nina's tapes, the world of psychical research immediately went

44
00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:55,800
Speaker 1: from crackpot theories to serious, government funded science. The American

45
00:02:55,840 --> 00:02:59,280
Speaker 1: government commissioned an intelligence report on what they called Soviet

46
00:02:59,320 --> 00:03:03,359
Speaker 1: psycho energetic threat. When it was finished, it was a bombshell.

47
00:03:03,639 --> 00:03:07,440
Speaker 1: Researchers and intelligence officials believed the Soviets were trying to

48
00:03:07,480 --> 00:03:10,919
Speaker 1: develop mind control and wanted to use people with powers

49
00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:14,880
Speaker 1: like Nina's to defeat their enemies. By nineteen seventy eight,

50
00:03:15,040 --> 00:03:18,519
Speaker 1: the CIA began its own top secret ESP program, which

51
00:03:18,520 --> 00:03:22,720
Speaker 1: they called Stargate, hoping to spy on the Soviets. Researchers

52
00:03:22,840 --> 00:03:26,360
Speaker 1: especially focused on remote viewing, or using a psychic to

53
00:03:26,400 --> 00:03:29,040
Speaker 1: see inside a place on the other side of the world.

54
00:03:29,400 --> 00:03:32,880
Speaker 1: They gave their subjects the coordinates of Soviet military bases

55
00:03:33,200 --> 00:03:36,320
Speaker 1: and asked them to describe what they saw in some cases,

56
00:03:36,520 --> 00:03:41,600
Speaker 1: the results were scarily accurate. Both countries continued psychical research

57
00:03:41,640 --> 00:03:44,000
Speaker 1: for the next few decades, although as far as we know,

58
00:03:44,080 --> 00:03:47,760
Speaker 1: they've yet to employ telekinesis or remote viewing as wide

59
00:03:47,760 --> 00:03:52,240
Speaker 1: scale weapons. However, sources report that military psychics were used

60
00:03:52,240 --> 00:03:55,480
Speaker 1: by Russia as recently as the Chechen Wars, which ended

61
00:03:55,680 --> 00:03:58,600
Speaker 1: in two thousand and nine. And as for Nina Well,

62
00:03:58,720 --> 00:04:01,400
Speaker 1: she gained international note notoriety for her part in the

63
00:04:01,400 --> 00:04:04,680
Speaker 1: psychic Cold War. She claimed the newspapers that she realized

64
00:04:04,680 --> 00:04:07,080
Speaker 1: her powers when she was young when she noticed that

65
00:04:07,120 --> 00:04:10,320
Speaker 1: things near her would move when she got angry. According

66
00:04:10,320 --> 00:04:13,080
Speaker 1: to her, her mother had the same ability to fine

67
00:04:13,120 --> 00:04:16,080
Speaker 1: tune it. She began to meditate to prepare herself to

68
00:04:16,160 --> 00:04:20,200
Speaker 1: concentrate intensely unmoving objects with her mind, and while she

69
00:04:20,240 --> 00:04:23,080
Speaker 1: had many supporters in the military, she found even more

70
00:04:23,080 --> 00:04:25,840
Speaker 1: critics once she went public with her powers. It was

71
00:04:25,880 --> 00:04:29,120
Speaker 1: pointed out that many of her miraculous tricks could be

72
00:04:29,160 --> 00:04:32,160
Speaker 1: faked using sleight of hand. Not to mention, the Soviet

73
00:04:32,240 --> 00:04:36,240
Speaker 1: Union had a reputation for exaggerating their victories for use

74
00:04:36,320 --> 00:04:39,680
Speaker 1: in propaganda, and wouldn't you know it, Nina was caught

75
00:04:39,760 --> 00:04:43,920
Speaker 1: cheating during demonstrations using magnets and tiny threads, and it

76
00:04:43,960 --> 00:04:46,039
Speaker 1: was believed by some that she had faked all of

77
00:04:46,080 --> 00:04:49,839
Speaker 1: her powers. Even Pravda, the official communist newspaper of the

78
00:04:49,880 --> 00:04:53,919
Speaker 1: Soviet Union, called her a fraud. In nineteen eighty seven,

79
00:04:54,000 --> 00:04:56,840
Speaker 1: another magazine called her a fake, and Nina sued and

80
00:04:56,960 --> 00:04:59,360
Speaker 1: won the lawsuit, and she maintained the truth of her

81
00:04:59,400 --> 00:05:03,920
Speaker 1: abilities until she died in nineteen ninety. Maybe Nina really

82
00:05:03,960 --> 00:05:07,200
Speaker 1: did have powers, or perhaps she was faking all along.

83
00:05:07,560 --> 00:05:09,840
Speaker 1: Either way, with all the news coverage of the debate,

84
00:05:10,320 --> 00:05:25,680
Speaker 1: she really did a great job of getting inside our heads.

85
00:05:27,240 --> 00:05:29,359
Speaker 1: When we think of World War II, we picture the

86
00:05:29,400 --> 00:05:33,000
Speaker 1: forces of the US and Western Europe coming together unanimously

87
00:05:33,040 --> 00:05:35,680
Speaker 1: to defeat the Germans. But it's easy to forget that

88
00:05:35,720 --> 00:05:39,080
Speaker 1: every nation had a diverse population with different views on

89
00:05:39,160 --> 00:05:44,039
Speaker 1: the war. There were Nazi sympathizers inside America, England, and France,

90
00:05:44,240 --> 00:05:48,080
Speaker 1: and there was resistance to the Nazis inside Germany and Austria.

91
00:05:48,440 --> 00:05:51,120
Speaker 1: Perhaps the most colorful example of this, though, came right

92
00:05:51,160 --> 00:05:53,599
Speaker 1: at the end of the war, when Americans, Germans, and

93
00:05:53,640 --> 00:05:56,719
Speaker 1: the French joined together at a castle in Austria to

94
00:05:56,800 --> 00:06:01,200
Speaker 1: defeat a Nazi assault. Castle. It was the Nazi version

95
00:06:01,320 --> 00:06:05,440
Speaker 1: of a luxury prison located in western Austria, sandwiched between

96
00:06:05,480 --> 00:06:09,080
Speaker 1: Germany and Italy. It housed French VIPs from the very

97
00:06:09,120 --> 00:06:11,800
Speaker 1: beginning of the war. Among the many who were held

98
00:06:11,800 --> 00:06:15,880
Speaker 1: there were Paul Renaud, former French Prime Minister, Marie Agnes Cayu,

99
00:06:16,040 --> 00:06:19,200
Speaker 1: sister of then leader of the French military Charles de Gaul,

100
00:06:19,480 --> 00:06:22,919
Speaker 1: and Tennis star Jean Buautra. As the Allies closed in

101
00:06:22,960 --> 00:06:25,920
Speaker 1: on Germany and Austria in April of nineteen forty five,

102
00:06:26,120 --> 00:06:29,320
Speaker 1: the guards at Castle Eiter fled, but the region was

103
00:06:29,360 --> 00:06:32,840
Speaker 1: still swarming with Nazis belonging to the ESS, the most

104
00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:36,680
Speaker 1: loyal and brutal organization within the German military, and the

105
00:06:36,760 --> 00:06:40,000
Speaker 1: French prisoners worried that if THEESS found them trying to escape,

106
00:06:40,080 --> 00:06:42,200
Speaker 1: they would kill them, and so they sent one of

107
00:06:42,240 --> 00:06:44,159
Speaker 1: their own to sneak out of the castle and through

108
00:06:44,160 --> 00:06:47,200
Speaker 1: the countryside to the nearest village, where they made contact

109
00:06:47,200 --> 00:06:51,520
Speaker 1: with Major Josef Gongel. Now Josef was Austrian, but he

110
00:06:51,560 --> 00:06:54,800
Speaker 1: had defected from the German military recently after seeing what

111
00:06:54,920 --> 00:06:58,159
Speaker 1: it had become under Hitler. He was filled with regrets

112
00:06:58,200 --> 00:07:01,400
Speaker 1: over his role in helping them conquer Europe. Joseph heard

113
00:07:01,400 --> 00:07:04,160
Speaker 1: about the plights of the French prisoners and immediately went

114
00:07:04,240 --> 00:07:06,960
Speaker 1: on a covert mission of his own, sneaking through the

115
00:07:06,960 --> 00:07:10,800
Speaker 1: countryside and making contact with a nearby American tank division.

116
00:07:11,120 --> 00:07:13,400
Speaker 1: It speaks to how late in the war this all was,

117
00:07:13,680 --> 00:07:16,240
Speaker 1: that these different factions were all right there on top

118
00:07:16,320 --> 00:07:19,360
Speaker 1: of each other. The combined pleas of Joseph and the

119
00:07:19,360 --> 00:07:22,120
Speaker 1: French prisoner were enough to motivate at least one of

120
00:07:22,160 --> 00:07:25,800
Speaker 1: the Americans, Captain John Kerrie Lee. He was only twenty

121
00:07:25,840 --> 00:07:28,400
Speaker 1: seven years old and a football player back home, and

122
00:07:28,440 --> 00:07:30,360
Speaker 1: as much as his men just wanted to keep their

123
00:07:30,400 --> 00:07:33,240
Speaker 1: heads down and avoid putting their lives on the line

124
00:07:33,280 --> 00:07:36,080
Speaker 1: this close to German surrender, Lee knew that it would

125
00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:38,880
Speaker 1: be wrong to leave the French prisoners there to die,

126
00:07:39,120 --> 00:07:41,720
Speaker 1: so he rallied his men and they began to drive

127
00:07:41,720 --> 00:07:45,160
Speaker 1: their tanks toward the castle. This was a process of attrition,

128
00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:48,240
Speaker 1: as they had to cross several bridges into the mountains

129
00:07:48,320 --> 00:07:51,320
Speaker 1: leading to the castle. The bridges were narrow and weak,

130
00:07:51,400 --> 00:07:54,320
Speaker 1: so Lee ended up leaving behind all but one of

131
00:07:54,320 --> 00:07:57,520
Speaker 1: his tanks. When they finally arrived at the castle, they

132
00:07:57,560 --> 00:08:00,400
Speaker 1: prepared to defend it from any SS troops who might

133
00:08:00,400 --> 00:08:03,640
Speaker 1: take an interest. Lee even blocked the entrance with his tank,

134
00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:06,840
Speaker 1: and the French prisoners were determined to help. Imagine the

135
00:08:06,920 --> 00:08:10,400
Speaker 1: elderly French prisoner Agnes holding a machine gun next to

136
00:08:10,440 --> 00:08:14,080
Speaker 1: a young American soldier, and of course Josef also continued

137
00:08:14,120 --> 00:08:17,800
Speaker 1: to assist, providing what insight he could into SS tactics.

138
00:08:18,440 --> 00:08:20,560
Speaker 1: They went to bed that night, hoping that all their

139
00:08:20,600 --> 00:08:23,880
Speaker 1: precautions wouldn't be needed, but as it so happened, a

140
00:08:23,920 --> 00:08:27,480
Speaker 1: lookout spotted grappling hooks on the castle walls. Just hours

141
00:08:27,520 --> 00:08:30,560
Speaker 1: into his watch, the SS were on their way, and

142
00:08:30,640 --> 00:08:33,080
Speaker 1: soon enough they were pouring out of the woods heading

143
00:08:33,200 --> 00:08:37,120
Speaker 1: for the castle. The Americans, the French, and Joseph all

144
00:08:37,160 --> 00:08:40,000
Speaker 1: stood side by side, firing machine guns down at the

145
00:08:40,040 --> 00:08:43,840
Speaker 1: invading army. Lee's tank fired off shells from the front gates,

146
00:08:44,000 --> 00:08:47,640
Speaker 1: blowing away any Germans who came close. But then things

147
00:08:47,679 --> 00:08:51,000
Speaker 1: took a turn for the worse. As morning arrived, German

148
00:08:51,080 --> 00:08:54,920
Speaker 1: eighty millimeter guns appeared on the horizon, blowing massive holes

149
00:08:54,960 --> 00:08:57,200
Speaker 1: in the side of the castle. Then one of the

150
00:08:57,200 --> 00:09:00,920
Speaker 1: shells got especially lucky, striking Lee's tank. His men had

151
00:09:00,960 --> 00:09:04,120
Speaker 1: just enough time to flee before it exploded into flames,

152
00:09:04,520 --> 00:09:07,640
Speaker 1: and so Joseph and Lee kept moving everyone further and

153
00:09:07,760 --> 00:09:10,720
Speaker 1: further into the castle. But this was a losing game.

154
00:09:11,120 --> 00:09:14,959
Speaker 1: In one last desperate gamble, they sent a volunteer, Jean

155
00:09:15,080 --> 00:09:18,400
Speaker 1: the Tennis Star, to pull vault over a castle wall

156
00:09:18,679 --> 00:09:22,000
Speaker 1: and sneak past the enemy lines to find help. While

157
00:09:22,040 --> 00:09:25,600
Speaker 1: they waited, Paul Renaud, the elderly former Prime Minister of France,

158
00:09:25,760 --> 00:09:30,560
Speaker 1: viciously fired down from a castle window, refusing to give up. Joseph,

159
00:09:30,760 --> 00:09:34,040
Speaker 1: sensing that Paul was in danger, rushed forward, throwing his

160
00:09:34,160 --> 00:09:37,480
Speaker 1: body in front of him. Joseph's instincts were correct, too.

161
00:09:37,840 --> 00:09:40,920
Speaker 1: A sniper's bullet meant for Paul struck him in the head,

162
00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:44,440
Speaker 1: killing him instantly. He had given everything to make up

163
00:09:44,440 --> 00:09:47,080
Speaker 1: for his role in the German Army, and that included

164
00:09:47,240 --> 00:09:51,080
Speaker 1: his life. Just as all hope seemed lost, new arrivals

165
00:09:51,080 --> 00:09:54,720
Speaker 1: appeared on the horizon. Jean the Tennis Star had been successful.

166
00:09:54,920 --> 00:09:57,920
Speaker 1: He'd found a second American tank division and led them

167
00:09:57,960 --> 00:10:00,760
Speaker 1: straight to the castle. He even showed up wearing one

168
00:10:00,840 --> 00:10:04,280
Speaker 1: of their uniforms, and soon enough the tanks tour through

169
00:10:04,280 --> 00:10:08,119
Speaker 1: the SS, driving them away from Castle Eider. The prisoners

170
00:10:08,200 --> 00:10:11,320
Speaker 1: were saved and the curious band of Americans, French and

171
00:10:11,440 --> 00:10:16,120
Speaker 1: German soldiers suffered zero casualties, that is except for Joseph,

172
00:10:16,240 --> 00:10:19,440
Speaker 1: who was later honored as an Austrian war hero, and

173
00:10:19,559 --> 00:10:23,000
Speaker 1: just three days later, the war in Europe was over.

174
00:10:27,000 --> 00:10:29,720
Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet

175
00:10:29,720 --> 00:10:33,600
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn

176
00:10:33,640 --> 00:10:38,040
Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.

177
00:10:38,240 --> 00:10:41,840
Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership

178
00:10:41,880 --> 00:10:45,160
Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show

179
00:10:45,280 --> 00:10:49,320
Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,

180
00:10:49,600 --> 00:10:51,439
Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the

181
00:10:51,640 --> 00:10:58,160
Speaker 1: Worldolore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.