WEBVTT - Selects: The Strange Story of Sea Monkeys 0:00:00.600 --> 0:00:03.120 Hey, everybody, it's Josh and for this week's select, I've 0:00:03.200 --> 0:00:05.800 chosen our episode on sea monkeys that came out in 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:09.440 March of twenty eighteen. Sea monkeys are one of those 0:00:09.440 --> 0:00:12.240 things that you just take for granted when you're a kid. 0:00:12.600 --> 0:00:15.360 There's that one ad that was in every single issue 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:18.000 of every single comic book, and for those of us 0:00:18.079 --> 0:00:20.479 lucky enough to mail off to get them, they became 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:23.040 an even bigger part of your childhood when you got 0:00:23.079 --> 0:00:25.840 to watch them swim around in their cool little plastic tank. 0:00:26.320 --> 0:00:29.560 But sea monkeys have an even more amazing backstory than this, 0:00:30.040 --> 0:00:33.080 not just of toy fame, but also of intrigue too. 0:00:33.560 --> 0:00:34.440 Hope you enjoy it. 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:47.200 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:52.120 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's 0:00:52.280 --> 0:00:56.080 Charles w Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry over there. We are 0:00:56.120 --> 0:01:01.560 swimmingly excited about this one because it is about sea monkeys. 0:01:02.880 --> 0:01:04.520 Jerry is mama sea monkey. 0:01:05.400 --> 0:01:08.640 Yes, she's got her little blonde bob hairdo going on. 0:01:09.640 --> 0:01:11.720 And I guess we're baby sea monkeys. 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:16.840 I guess, yeah, that's cool. We'll let's we'll let the 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:22.400 dad not exist. Okay, we're brothers, that's right. I think 0:01:22.400 --> 0:01:22.959 that's a good. 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:25.480 Move with a non existent father, which really explains a 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:26.080 lot about us. 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:30.280 Non existent sea monkey father no less. Yeah, So, Chuck, 0:01:30.959 --> 0:01:34.800 I realized that I don't know something about you, which 0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:38.000 is weird because we've been doing this for almost ten years. 0:01:37.800 --> 0:01:38.920 And we're Sea Monkey brothers. 0:01:39.120 --> 0:01:41.800 We are. We know a lot about one another. We 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:42.800 know one another. 0:01:42.680 --> 0:01:50.160 Smells, looks, scowls, all sorts of stuff, right, triumphs, victories. 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:53.320 One thing I don't know about you is whether you 0:01:53.520 --> 0:01:55.120 were into comic books as a kid. 0:01:55.880 --> 0:01:59.600 Well, glad you asked. I feel like we've talked about 0:01:59.640 --> 0:02:03.440 this at some point, but maybe not. I yeah, we 0:02:03.480 --> 0:02:07.160 have for sure, Okay, because remember I read Archie and 0:02:07.240 --> 0:02:07.800 Richie Rich. 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:09.880 Oh yes, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. 0:02:09.800 --> 0:02:12.000 And I wasn't Well, here's a couple of things. I 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:16.720 read Archie and Richie Rich growing up and didn't get 0:02:16.760 --> 0:02:19.320 into the superhero comics much because I don't know why. 0:02:20.480 --> 0:02:23.880 But then, also, you don't know this part. We used 0:02:23.919 --> 0:02:27.400 to go to visit my grandmother on my father's side. 0:02:27.720 --> 0:02:29.080 She was big time into Thor. 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:36.360 Granny Thor. She lived in Jackson, Tennessee, and it was. 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:39.960 I had sort of the modern grandparents with cable TV 0:02:40.040 --> 0:02:43.920 who lived in a condo, and then old school granny 0:02:43.919 --> 0:02:46.840 who lived in a house in the country. And so 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:50.480 granted Granny Bryant didn't have TV or anything like that, 0:02:51.040 --> 0:02:53.760 but what she did have in the back room was 0:02:54.240 --> 0:02:58.080 a bunch of my dad and Uncle Ed's old toys 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:00.720 and comic books from when they were kids. It's nice, 0:03:01.000 --> 0:03:03.320 so I think they're mainly Uncle Eddie. So I got 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:06.320 I had a big stack of comics from I guess 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:13.240 the nineteen sixties that were like Man from Uncle. I'm 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:15.280 trying to read. I'm trying to think of a few more. 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:21.600 No superhero stuff, but just those weird sort of I 0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:23.799 guess it wasn't weird, but Man from Uncle is the 0:03:23.800 --> 0:03:24.639 only one I can remember. 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:25.880 But it's a little weird. 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:30.720 Long story short is because that's all the entertainment we 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:33.839 had to ingest. We would my brother and I would 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:38.160 go back there and read those every year for years. 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:40.480 That's pretty awesome, the same comics. 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:43.040 So you made your way through that stack multiple. 0:03:42.720 --> 0:03:44.520 Times, oh many many times? 0:03:44.560 --> 0:03:44.960 Gotcha? 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:48.800 Like I remember the ads, I remember, I remember everything 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:49.680 about them. 0:03:49.560 --> 0:03:52.040 So then you remember, obviously, I think you probably knew 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:54.440 where I was going with this from the outset. You 0:03:54.520 --> 0:03:57.360 remember the ads for the Sea Monkeys, then. 0:03:57.840 --> 0:04:01.760 I remember Sea Monkeys, I remember for X ray specs, sure, 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:05.160 which we'll get into. And I remember for sure all 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:09.240 the ads for like can you draw this parrot? Or pirate? Oh? 0:04:09.360 --> 0:04:11.560 Yeah? Remember that for the art school? 0:04:11.800 --> 0:04:12.560 Yeah? What was that? 0:04:12.960 --> 0:04:14.920 I think they just took your money and then sent 0:04:14.960 --> 0:04:16.120 you a degree. 0:04:15.760 --> 0:04:16.719 For your art school. 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:17.720 Is that what it was? 0:04:17.880 --> 0:04:18.640 I'm pretty sure. 0:04:19.160 --> 0:04:19.960 So disappointing. 0:04:20.200 --> 0:04:22.000 Yeah, but the turtle was pretty cool. 0:04:22.040 --> 0:04:24.680 He had like a Newsy camp on and a turtleneck 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:27.800 and he just looked like he was ready to get mellow, 0:04:27.839 --> 0:04:28.039 you know. 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:29.800 Yeah? Oh you know. The other one too was the 0:04:31.480 --> 0:04:33.479 Charles Atlas workout thing. Do you remember that? 0:04:33.920 --> 0:04:36.640 Yeah, where the ninety eight pound weekling gets sand kicked 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:39.760 in his face. Totally man, Yeah, that's really playing on 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:42.280 some fifteen year old's insecurities and. 0:04:42.320 --> 0:04:44.560 Worked Oh yeah, for sure. Sure, And what about you? 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:47.080 I remember Sea Monkeys. 0:04:47.360 --> 0:04:49.479 There's one that always stuck out to me was a 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:52.200 Bonker's ad from the eighties. This would have been way 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:56.400 past your man from Uncle era comic books. But I 0:04:56.440 --> 0:04:59.159 think I've asked you before if you'd ever had Bonkers, 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:01.520 they are like these fruit. They were like just the 0:05:02.160 --> 0:05:05.760 superior Starburst. And there was a comic book ad in 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:08.719 there with like this like kind of crotchety old lady 0:05:08.760 --> 0:05:10.560 in it, and I don't even remember the gist of it. 0:05:10.600 --> 0:05:12.400 I think maybe she was mad that the kid was 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:16.039 eating bonkers and enjoying it. I don't know, but I'll 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:19.040 never forget that comic for some reason, because the colors 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:21.600 in it were just just perfect and they struck my 0:05:21.640 --> 0:05:25.120 brain just right. So I've always got that Bonker's comic 0:05:25.120 --> 0:05:27.960 book ad in there too, and a lot of bubble 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:31.080 bubbleum comic book ads are stuck in there as well. 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:34.720 Nothing that means anything really, and certainly nothing pertinent to 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:37.200 this episode except for that Sea Monkey's ad. 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:39.560 Yeah, but you and I were also into Mad Magazine 0:05:39.560 --> 0:05:42.200 big Time, which I believe was ad free, wasn't it. 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:44.679 It was they had like those fake ads, oh yeah, 0:05:44.720 --> 0:05:48.680 of course, which were pretty hilarious, sure, but now that 0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:51.120 I don't think they had any like actual ads in them. 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:54.880 They were just strictly subscription based, that's right. So in 0:05:54.920 --> 0:05:57.680 that Sea Monkey's ad, if you'll remember correctly, and I 0:05:57.680 --> 0:06:01.000 think for many decades. It was very actually the same thing. 0:06:01.839 --> 0:06:08.200 It was this kind of group, this tribe of humanoid figures. 0:06:09.240 --> 0:06:12.880 It was a family, but exactly what kind of family 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:16.240 they were is really up for debate. So there they 0:06:16.240 --> 0:06:20.239 were kind of lanky, like stringy, ropey arms and legs, 0:06:20.800 --> 0:06:24.960 paunchy tummies, naked is the day they were born, sure, 0:06:25.360 --> 0:06:28.799 webbed feet, webbed tails, Like the end of their tail 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:31.479 was like webbed, which if you look closely, I think 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:35.920 was probably just a device to cover dad's junk in 0:06:36.040 --> 0:06:39.599 the in the illustration, they were like, we need something 0:06:39.640 --> 0:06:43.640 on the end of their tail there, buddy, And it's 0:06:43.880 --> 0:06:46.919 just like this classic illustration of the sea monkeys that 0:06:47.000 --> 0:06:49.720 apparently was done by this guy named Joe Orlando. 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:50.760 Mad Magazine. 0:06:51.040 --> 0:06:54.960 Yeah, he's from Mad magazine. Creepy Magazine is another one. Uh, 0:06:55.120 --> 0:06:58.520 he ran some comic lines at DC Comics for allays 0:06:58.640 --> 0:07:01.240 kind of a legend, but he's also extremely well known 0:07:01.279 --> 0:07:04.640 outside of the comic world for having drawn that sea 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:05.479 monkey family. 0:07:06.600 --> 0:07:08.600 Yeah, I mean, I'll get at it right now. Look 0:07:08.600 --> 0:07:12.200 at that. It's like unchanged. 0:07:11.760 --> 0:07:12.040 I know. 0:07:12.080 --> 0:07:14.360 And what's great too, is if we'll talk about later, 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:17.240 somebody some people went in and fiddled around with it. 0:07:17.360 --> 0:07:19.320 And if you look now, if you go to buy 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:22.520 the sea monkeys now, they're basically back to the way 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:23.320 they were before. 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:26.200 Well yeah, and we'll get to that too. You also 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:29.320 didn't mention the castle, which is kind of key because 0:07:29.360 --> 0:07:32.520 somehow they have these little crown like heads and I 0:07:32.560 --> 0:07:35.520 guess we're kings of the bowl. 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:39.800 I guess they were. Yeah, they were a royal sea 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:41.000 monkey family. 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:44.360 Kings of the fishbowl, and only inhabitants actually. 0:07:44.400 --> 0:07:47.320 So if you right, so you could proclaim yourself the 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:50.240 royal family, you mean, And I have done that at 0:07:50.240 --> 0:07:53.720 our house. So if you look closely at some of 0:07:53.720 --> 0:07:56.840 those ads, they say, there's like a little fine print 0:07:56.840 --> 0:07:59.520 that says these are caricatures of sea monkeys. It's not 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:02.040 actually what your sea monkeys look like, or it's an 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:05.600 artist interpretation or something like that. And it turns out 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:09.800 that sea monkeys and just prepare for your childhood to 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:12.080 blow away like so much dust in the wind, chuck, 0:08:12.520 --> 0:08:17.960 sea monkeys don't actually exist. There's no such thing. Yeah, 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:19.200 did you know that already? 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:27.400 Well, of course, well, sea monkeys, uh as, sea monkeys 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:31.800 don't exist, but they are real, little living creatures that 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:35.680 you buy, right, have shipped in an envelope back in 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:38.480 those days, in an envelope to your home. 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:41.480 And they are actually their own things. 0:08:41.559 --> 0:08:45.600 So what they are ultimately is something called artemia or 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.480 Brian shrimp. Yes, but the guy who ended up calling 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:52.400 them sea monkeys was actually well within his right to 0:08:52.440 --> 0:08:55.080 call them something different than just Brian shrimp, because they're 0:08:55.200 --> 0:08:58.079 a hybrid version of Brian shrimp. The guy who invented 0:08:58.080 --> 0:09:02.720 sea monkeys actually anchored along with a micro crustaceans expert 0:09:02.880 --> 0:09:05.520 named Di Augustino. 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:06.880 I can't remember his first name. 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:10.280 I think when you have a name like Degastino, you 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:11.120 can just go buy that. 0:09:11.559 --> 0:09:16.439 So Degastino and this guy named Harold von Broughton or 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:21.480 braun Hot, right, they got together and they actually took 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:25.280 Brian shrimp and made them into something different, a hybrid 0:09:25.360 --> 0:09:28.240 version that we now know and love as sea monkeys. 0:09:28.559 --> 0:09:32.960 Yeah, so the literal sea monkeys that you buy don't 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:36.920 exist in nature, right, They are a man made creation. 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:40.160 I don't think we can get that through clearly enough, 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:44.840 because it's pretty scientifically, it's pretty amazing. And they did 0:09:44.840 --> 0:09:50.720 that because they couldn't find any of these Brian shrimp 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:56.520 varieties that would live through the shipping process and be 0:09:56.600 --> 0:09:59.920 able to be essentially rehydrated and brought to life to 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:04.439 the delight of children. So they made them right and there's. 0:10:04.120 --> 0:10:08.120 No clapping and squealing with original Brian shrimp right now. 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.559 So through these cross breeding programs they made Brian shrimp. 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:14.560 Brian shrimp were already you could. I think you can 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:16.640 still go to pet stores and buy them. They're a 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:20.480 type of food. They're a pet food, yeah, and all 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:25.240 they're just like tiny little micro crustaceans and they enter 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:29.920 into what's called cryptobiosis and they're basically if you'll remember 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:32.439 our tartar Grade episode, they basically do the same thing 0:10:32.480 --> 0:10:36.360 that tartagrades do. They enter into the state of suspended animation, 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:40.400 a desiccated state where they're just dried out and just 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:42.559 sitting there waiting for the conditions to be right to 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:46.679 basically come back to life. That's what sea monkeys are. 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:50.439 Yeah, So you get this little package they're basically their 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:53.240 Brian shrimp eggs is what it is, or what they are, 0:10:53.760 --> 0:10:56.160 and then you get purified water put them in there, 0:10:56.880 --> 0:11:00.000 and I believe there's a growth formula as well. Right. 0:11:00.520 --> 0:11:03.400 Yeah, that's like their food. It's like spirrillina and yeast, I. 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:07.280 Believe, right, but it's no one truly knows what the 0:11:07.320 --> 0:11:10.480 exact formulation for all this stuff is because it is 0:11:10.520 --> 0:11:14.240 locked in a vault in Manhattan because it was it 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:16.760 was the only one that worked, and it was owned 0:11:18.160 --> 0:11:21.559 owned by this Van Broughton character, Van Broughton bron Hutt. 0:11:21.640 --> 0:11:23.880 Bron Hutt. I don't know. It's a tough word, tough 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:24.480 name to say. 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:26.560 I've seen it a hundred times in the last like 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:27.600 eight hours. 0:11:27.240 --> 0:11:28.559 But still yeah. 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:32.760 So until he died in two thousand and three, Harold 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:35.960 von Bronhutt and his wife Yolanda were the only two 0:11:36.040 --> 0:11:39.360 people on the planet who knew what the special formula 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:43.160 was that created those conditions. Because remember, you've got sea 0:11:43.200 --> 0:11:46.360 monkeys little Brian shrimp that are in the state of 0:11:46.400 --> 0:11:49.440 crypto bios. This is this dried out, descated state, and 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:52.880 when you put them just into regular tap water, they 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:56.720 don't necessarily come to life. There's something in that powder 0:11:57.160 --> 0:12:00.840 that alters the pH and the salinity and makes it 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:06.520 just perfect for them to emerge from this cryptobiosis almost instantaneously. 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:07.120 Yeah. 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:10.240 In fact, early on, the sea monkeys were originally just 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:13.440 called Instant Life, I believe, is what the name they 0:12:13.440 --> 0:12:17.480 were originally marketed under. Yeah, not the best name. 0:12:17.920 --> 0:12:22.599 No, and it is it's weird that that name was 0:12:22.679 --> 0:12:26.480 chosen because it turns out that Harold von Braunhutt is 0:12:27.280 --> 0:12:33.000 or was a marketing genius. He wrote the original thirty 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:37.120 two page booklet that I believe still comes with the sets. 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:37.600 Is that right? 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:40.240 I couldn't find evidence of that, and I was looking 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:43.040 online to find a transcription of it and was very 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:46.640 surprised to find no one's done that. Like you would 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.360 think there'd be entire fan sites that are that this 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.120 is like their bible, you know, the original version of 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:54.199 it would have later editions of it. 0:12:54.200 --> 0:12:55.400 Couldn't find it anywhere. 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:57.080 Well, I don't know if it still comes with it, 0:12:57.120 --> 0:13:00.000 but for many many many years and even after his death, 0:13:00.600 --> 0:13:08.000 that original pros which told this fantastical story. I mean, 0:13:08.000 --> 0:13:09.800 that's the whole point. It wasn't just like add water 0:13:09.920 --> 0:13:11.880 and you're on set, right, I told the whole story 0:13:11.880 --> 0:13:12.600 of sea monkeys. 0:13:12.920 --> 0:13:13.120 Yeah. 0:13:13.160 --> 0:13:17.000 It said things like your sea monkeys can be hypnotized, 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:21.320 you can train them to play baseball, you can race them. 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:25.280 They're they're like they love to race all sorts of things. 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:27.880 You can basically train them into a pack of friendly seals, 0:13:27.880 --> 0:13:28.880 I think is the way. 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:29.840 They put it. 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:34.360 It talked about like their courtship and reproduction and just 0:13:34.400 --> 0:13:36.960 all sorts of stuff like it was, Yeah, this guy's 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:40.160 just basically do you remember that that treatment that George 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:44.600 Lucas wrote about Wookies and Chewbacca's planet that got turned 0:13:44.600 --> 0:13:47.240 into the Star Wars Christmas special? Yeah, this is the 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:50.640 exact same thing. But this is the Sea Monkeys world, right. 0:13:50.640 --> 0:13:52.520 I would like to see what I was about to say, 0:13:52.520 --> 0:13:54.320 I'd like to see the Sea Monkeys TV show, but 0:13:54.840 --> 0:13:55.480 I did. 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:56.600 What did you think? 0:13:56.800 --> 0:13:57.680 Did you watch any of it? 0:13:57.880 --> 0:13:58.559 Yeah? I did. 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:00.679 Yeah. So that was a TV show in the eighties 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:07.520 starring Howie Mentel. Yeah, it just really doesn't get any better. Like, 0:14:07.559 --> 0:14:09.960 who else would have been better than Howie Mandel for that? 0:14:10.240 --> 0:14:13.160 It was Howie Mendel. He produced it as well, along 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.000 with the Chioto brothers, who were known for making killer 0:14:16.000 --> 0:14:17.120 clowns from outer space. 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:18.920 Yeah, so you know what you're kind of going to 0:14:18.960 --> 0:14:19.360 get there. 0:14:19.560 --> 0:14:22.760 It is the definition of camp Like they watched Pee 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:25.160 Wee's Playhouse and they're like, this is kind of campy. 0:14:25.200 --> 0:14:28.600 But let's increase it by thirty five percent. Yeah, and 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:29.360 that's what they did. 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:31.680 It was not long for this world though, what right? 0:14:31.960 --> 0:14:32.040 No? 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:33.800 And the thing is is, I don't know if we've 0:14:33.800 --> 0:14:36.120 gotten this across. It was live action. 0:14:36.400 --> 0:14:38.440 Oh yeah, it wasn't a cartoon. 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:40.880 That's what made it so not just campy. That made 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:43.920 it unsettling as well, Like the actors were all done 0:14:44.000 --> 0:14:47.680 up as like sea monkeys, and it was four kids, 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:50.400 but it was obviously made by adults with a wink 0:14:50.440 --> 0:14:51.960 and a nod to other adults. 0:14:52.240 --> 0:14:54.240 It was a weird, weird, weird show. 0:14:54.600 --> 0:14:55.120 Yeah it was. 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:55.560 Uh. 0:14:56.880 --> 0:14:58.920 I didn't see it, and I only watched like a 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:02.360 bit of one episode enough to judge the whole eleven 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:06.520 I think episode lifespan. But it was like Sid and 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:08.960 Marty Kroft without the LSD. 0:15:10.200 --> 0:15:15.600 Right, it was with PCP instinct. That's how it struck me. 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:18.480 I was like, these people are on angel dust. 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:22.240 Yeah. But all this to say that it was and 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:25.360 continues to be a big selling item. Like kids loved 0:15:25.480 --> 0:15:29.920 sea monkeys. They bought them, and I mean, from what 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.120 I can tell, when kids bought sea monkeys, they didn't 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:35.320 care that they didn't look like those things, and they 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:37.200 were just thought it was cool that something they got 0:15:37.240 --> 0:15:38.680 in the mail really did come to life. 0:15:38.880 --> 0:15:41.360 Yeah, for sure, and you could raise them and after, 0:15:41.720 --> 0:15:46.200 you know, after some tinkering, Von Brounhutt managed to get 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:47.440 them to live for a while. 0:15:47.520 --> 0:15:49.920 So these were like pets to the kids. 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:52.760 Plus I also think Chuck I suspect and this is 0:15:52.800 --> 0:15:55.520 a big reason why sea monkeys were such a success. 0:15:56.800 --> 0:15:59.880 Von Brounhutt when he started to market these things early on, 0:16:00.480 --> 0:16:03.160 he was following immediately in the wake of something called 0:16:03.200 --> 0:16:06.320 instant fish that I think Whammo had tried to market 0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:09.760 and had failed terribly at And he was going around 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:13.479 trying to market something similar, and toy stores and retailers 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:15.640 were like, we don't want anything to do with those. 0:16:15.720 --> 0:16:18.560 People almost lost their jobs over that instant fish stuff. 0:16:19.000 --> 0:16:19.720 Get out of here. 0:16:20.160 --> 0:16:23.360 So von Braunhaut, in a stroke of genius, said, you 0:16:23.360 --> 0:16:25.480 know what, I'm going to go right to the source. 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:28.360 So he started marketing directly two kids. 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:30.720 He started hanging out at elementary school parking lot. 0:16:30.840 --> 0:16:33.520 He did, and he'd be like, here, here, kid, come 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:34.400 look at my minivan. 0:16:34.480 --> 0:16:36.240 I've got a bunch of stuff for you to choose from. 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:38.120 Right, Yeah, Well, the comic book thing was a stroke 0:16:38.160 --> 0:16:42.280 of genius. How many like three three and a half 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:45.320 million ads a year? Was that it? Or pages? 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:49.160 Three hundred and three million pages? Oh wow a year? 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:52.680 And now though, so most of those were two page inserts. 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:56.120 So that's one hundred and fifty issues of one hundred 0:16:56.120 --> 0:16:58.160 and fifty million issues of comic books a year. 0:16:58.400 --> 0:16:59.800 I wonder how expensive that was. 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:00.560 I don't know. 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:03.120 I'm quite sure he got some deals over the years, 0:17:03.160 --> 0:17:06.320 because he started that marketing push in nineteen sixty four, 0:17:07.119 --> 0:17:10.040 and I don't know exactly when it stopped, but it 0:17:10.119 --> 0:17:12.520 was well into the nineties that there were sea monkey 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:16.080 ads and comic books still that were virtually the same 0:17:16.119 --> 0:17:16.760 as ever. 0:17:16.720 --> 0:17:18.119 Did you ever buy any of that stuff? 0:17:18.600 --> 0:17:20.800 I had a friend who had sea monkeys. I never 0:17:20.840 --> 0:17:22.960 did myself. Oh, but that was a point that I 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:25.679 was getting away from that I wanted to make. I 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:28.000 think one of the reasons sea monkeys were successful was 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.040 because it wasn't just that these things were pets or whatever. 0:17:31.560 --> 0:17:35.680 You ordered them yourself, like, you handled this transaction yourself right, 0:17:35.960 --> 0:17:39.240 and you got to show your friends something that you purchased, 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:41.040 like your parents didn't take you to the store or 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:46.760 anything like that. You contracted with this strange man to 0:17:46.880 --> 0:17:50.280 buy these Brian shrimp from him, and they arrived and 0:17:50.320 --> 0:17:53.159 you followed the instructions and now they're floating around. 0:17:53.280 --> 0:17:56.480 Yeah, well, you probably got mom or dad to cut 0:17:56.480 --> 0:17:59.720 you a forty nine cent check or have them cut 0:17:59.720 --> 0:18:03.879 a check, or you know, you you maybe got the 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:06.720 funds from your lemonade stand and converted that to a 0:18:06.840 --> 0:18:07.480 cash bond. 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:11.040 Yeap, a bear bond. 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:14.200 I don't know what any of that stuff is, but yeah, 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:15.879 so you probably had little assistance for mom and that, 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:18.200 or maybe you put a dollar in an envelope. 0:18:18.320 --> 0:18:21.760 I'll bet many kids did. I wonder if brown Hut 0:18:21.920 --> 0:18:25.320 sent the the change the change back, or was like, 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:28.000 I'm keeping this change, kid, just to teach you a 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:30.000 lesson that to send a dollar bill in the mail. 0:18:29.840 --> 0:18:32.040 Anymore, because he can't send change in the mail, right. 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:36.680 Right, So, I mean suffice to say, sea monkeys were 0:18:37.040 --> 0:18:40.080 and are just like one of the classic toys of 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.280 all time, largely because of the way they were marketed. 0:18:43.400 --> 0:18:43.560 Right. 0:18:44.119 --> 0:18:46.239 Well, yeah, and von brown Hut this was not his 0:18:46.320 --> 0:18:50.280 only jam. He had close to two hundred patents on everything. 0:18:50.800 --> 0:18:53.639 Like you know, we mentioned the X ray specs and 0:18:53.680 --> 0:18:56.639 that great, great ad of the guy looking at his 0:18:56.720 --> 0:19:01.440 hand or the or the sec system misogynistic ad of 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:04.720 him leering at a woman in a dress, right, and 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:08.520 X ray spex were very disappointing him when you got those, 0:19:08.600 --> 0:19:12.840 because they were it was two pieces of cardboard with 0:19:12.920 --> 0:19:16.080 little pinholes that you look through, and in between the 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:19.200 cardboard where that pinhole is is a feather. 0:19:19.760 --> 0:19:22.800 Right, And so what it did was it basically projected 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:27.879 two overlapping images of the same thing. So the edges 0:19:27.960 --> 0:19:30.880 around the outside of it were just kind of fuzzier 0:19:30.880 --> 0:19:31.480 than the middle. 0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:33.960 Basically, Yeah, supposedly. 0:19:33.320 --> 0:19:36.119 That was what an X ray of your hand looked like. 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:42.840 Yeah, so that that's a case of fraud, Yeah, a 0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:45.560 good way to put it. Or what about the invisible Goldfish? 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:46.240 That was another one? 0:19:46.359 --> 0:19:49.680 Is that is that's so fraudulent that it's just beautiful, 0:19:49.720 --> 0:19:51.280 it's elegant, and it's fraudulent. 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:54.600 Well, but it's almost not fraudulent because here was the deal. 0:19:54.720 --> 0:20:00.080 He sold what was called invisible goldfish, which basically means nothing. 0:20:00.720 --> 0:20:02.720 He sold nothing successfully. 0:20:03.440 --> 0:20:03.600 Right. 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:06.680 It was a the kit came with the fishbowl, fish 0:20:06.760 --> 0:20:09.440 food and instructions and that was it. 0:20:10.600 --> 0:20:11.520 And there was a. 0:20:11.480 --> 0:20:14.680 Guarantee that you would never see your invisible fish, well, 0:20:14.720 --> 0:20:16.040 that they would remain invisible. 0:20:16.119 --> 0:20:18.520 Yeah, and that's I think that is the distinction that 0:20:18.600 --> 0:20:21.400 makes it not fraud. Right, is he basically said, you're 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:22.600 not going to see anything in this bowl. 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:24.520 Yeah, and that was that. 0:20:25.320 --> 0:20:26.080 What else did he do? 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:29.879 He had He invented balder dash. 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:30.600 Oh, that's right. 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:34.880 He also invented those doll's eyes where you lay your 0:20:34.880 --> 0:20:38.000 doll back and its eyes closed. He invented those. 0:20:38.240 --> 0:20:41.680 Yeah, he invented that technology, which is was a game 0:20:41.760 --> 0:20:43.600 changer for creepy baby dolls. 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.639 He also, even before his days of inventing, he was 0:20:47.520 --> 0:20:51.480 an interesting guy basically his whole life. He he raced 0:20:51.560 --> 0:20:54.480 motorcycles and cars under the name of the Green Hornet. 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:59.119 He was a talent manager for a couple of people. 0:20:59.160 --> 0:21:00.320 One was a mental list. 0:21:01.160 --> 0:21:04.439 Yeah, talent talent manager like Broadway Danny Rose was a 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:05.160 talent manager. 0:21:05.320 --> 0:21:07.880 Okay, I don't know that is bumau go along with it? 0:21:08.880 --> 0:21:11.880 What is that? Is that? What's that from the Name's familiar, 0:21:11.880 --> 0:21:12.320 but I don't know. 0:21:12.520 --> 0:21:14.359 It was a Woody Allen movie where he played that 0:21:14.480 --> 0:21:16.919 was it was a talent manager that managed like you 0:21:16.960 --> 0:21:19.879 know people like this that would the high divers, that 0:21:19.920 --> 0:21:23.960 would dive into shallow pools and mentalists. And this guy 0:21:24.040 --> 0:21:26.280 was even a wouldn't he a mentalist for a. 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:29.000 Little while, I didn't see that. I wouldn't be at 0:21:29.040 --> 0:21:29.840 all surprised. 0:21:30.040 --> 0:21:31.520 Yeah, I think he did a little work as the 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:32.240 Great something. 0:21:32.720 --> 0:21:34.600 Did you see? Well he managed a guy named the 0:21:34.600 --> 0:21:37.320 Great Danager. I didn't get whether that was him or not, 0:21:37.400 --> 0:21:38.200 though it could have been. 0:21:38.320 --> 0:21:40.320 No, no, no, that was that was That was him 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:42.240 and he had his own act. 0:21:42.240 --> 0:21:45.840 Oh god, okay, did you see the guy who who 0:21:46.160 --> 0:21:49.760 the high dive guy? Did you see his jump? 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:50.720 No? 0:21:51.160 --> 0:21:55.600 Oh my, okay, there's a guy named Amrie Lemouth. I 0:21:55.680 --> 0:21:59.840 believe Yeah he Yeah, Imri Lamouth. If you go look, 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:05.000 I'm up, Hi, n Ri Lamoth, You're going to be 0:22:05.040 --> 0:22:07.600 treated to an ap video that was shot in the 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:10.760 early seventies from the looks of it, where he's opening 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:13.400 up for an evil canievil act in a parking lot 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:16.640 and god knows where in New Jersey, and he climbs 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:21.040 up this ladder, a forty foot ladder, and below beneath 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:24.359 is one of these tiny little kiddie pools filled with 0:22:24.440 --> 0:22:27.919 like eighteen inches of water, and this guy, who is 0:22:28.040 --> 0:22:34.120 clearly in his mid seventies maybe older, dives forty feet 0:22:34.160 --> 0:22:38.000 into eighteen inches of water in a kiddie pool belly first. 0:22:38.000 --> 0:22:40.560 He does basically a belly flop and immediately stands up 0:22:40.600 --> 0:22:41.240 with like teta. 0:22:42.160 --> 0:22:44.280 It's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen 0:22:44.320 --> 0:22:45.200 in my life. 0:22:46.160 --> 0:22:49.920 And this guy, Harold von Braunhutt, managed that guy back 0:22:49.960 --> 0:22:50.480 in the day. 0:22:51.040 --> 0:22:54.159 Yeah, okay, he wasn't a He was a magician who 0:22:54.240 --> 0:22:55.919 worked under the name the Great. 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:58.360 Tilepo that's a pretty good name. 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:02.199 And he also admitted something the Directomat, which was this 0:23:02.359 --> 0:23:06.399 device where you punch in your destination, like you're in 0:23:06.440 --> 0:23:09.679 New York City, you punch in your destination and the 0:23:09.680 --> 0:23:11.800 machine told you the fastest subway route. 0:23:12.200 --> 0:23:13.040 Oh that's smart. 0:23:13.119 --> 0:23:14.280 It was Google Maps. 0:23:14.720 --> 0:23:17.480 That's very smart, like fifty years early, but using like 0:23:17.600 --> 0:23:21.440 punch cards instead of you know, real technology basically. 0:23:21.480 --> 0:23:23.720 But I mean, the guy, you know, not only was 0:23:23.760 --> 0:23:26.360 he a marketing genius, he had a real knack for 0:23:26.480 --> 0:23:29.360 inventing some successful useful things. 0:23:29.640 --> 0:23:31.360 So he had this other thing that you could get 0:23:31.359 --> 0:23:34.600 for like fifty nine to ninety five, and it was 0:23:34.640 --> 0:23:37.600 actually a weapon, so much so that he was stopped 0:23:37.600 --> 0:23:41.320 at LaGuardia Airport in nineteen seventy nine and arrested because 0:23:41.359 --> 0:23:44.080 he had a briefcase of samples of this stuff that 0:23:44.160 --> 0:23:46.760 he was selling I think through mail order, and it 0:23:46.880 --> 0:23:51.800 was called the what is Coyoga Agent M five? 0:23:52.359 --> 0:23:55.760 Yeah, the Kyoga Agent in five. It's basically a telescoping 0:23:55.880 --> 0:24:00.639 metal whip. You know, you've seen the telescoping batons and 0:24:00.720 --> 0:24:05.600 things that cops can use. I guess a sure anybody 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:08.120 can use them. And do actually had one of those 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:09.320 for a little while for some reason? 0:24:09.480 --> 0:24:10.200 Did you really? 0:24:10.520 --> 0:24:12.000 I did? I thought, you know what, I'm not a 0:24:12.040 --> 0:24:13.919 gun guy, but I thought, I'll put this thing in 0:24:13.960 --> 0:24:17.240 the floorboard in my car. Sure, and if anyone ever 0:24:18.000 --> 0:24:20.439 reaches their hand in the window, then they're gonna get 0:24:20.440 --> 0:24:24.800 a wrapped knuckles smart that's funny. I don't know where 0:24:24.800 --> 0:24:26.879 it went though. It didn't telescope properly, so I was like, 0:24:26.920 --> 0:24:27.840 that's probably not good. 0:24:28.040 --> 0:24:30.960 No, it's not because you I mean, that's not what 0:24:31.000 --> 0:24:32.919 you want and you plus, you have to practice with 0:24:32.960 --> 0:24:33.879 that kind of thing, that's all. 0:24:34.000 --> 0:24:36.439 It's a big commitment. You just turning and running is 0:24:36.480 --> 0:24:37.040 way better. 0:24:37.280 --> 0:24:39.240 Well, yeah, just I went back to plan A, which 0:24:39.280 --> 0:24:43.440 is poo poop my pants and cry right, hopefully that works. 0:24:43.560 --> 0:24:45.359 No one wants to punch of guy who's just pooped 0:24:45.359 --> 0:24:46.200 his pants, you know. 0:24:46.480 --> 0:24:49.320 All right, so none of the butt at least, right, 0:24:50.520 --> 0:24:56.639 So this m five telescoping want or whip. This is 0:24:56.640 --> 0:25:00.119 where things get weird. Yeah, and we'll we'll set this 0:25:00.280 --> 0:25:04.480 up right before the ad break, because it turns out 0:25:04.640 --> 0:25:10.960 that mister von bro Hud, mister von brown Hut was 0:25:11.000 --> 0:25:19.480 perhaps almost certifiably a white nationalist aryan Nazi. Sure is 0:25:19.480 --> 0:25:20.160 that fair to say? 0:25:20.440 --> 0:25:21.680 I think so? All right, and. 0:25:21.640 --> 0:25:22.919 We'll get to that right after this. 0:25:23.200 --> 0:25:26.639 If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just 0:25:26.840 --> 0:25:49.400 listen to JH. Sh Suffus no STUFFU No, okay, Chuck. 0:25:49.440 --> 0:25:52.160 I'm sure everybody just bit the tips of their fingers 0:25:52.160 --> 0:25:54.280 off waiting for those ads to finish so we could 0:25:54.320 --> 0:25:55.400 get back to it. 0:25:55.440 --> 0:25:56.679 Is it fair to call him a Nazi? 0:25:57.400 --> 0:25:59.880 So here's the thing. It has been. 0:26:00.000 --> 0:26:05.119 He's so thoroughly documented by legitimate sources like the Washington Post, 0:26:05.640 --> 0:26:07.000 the Los Angeles. 0:26:06.640 --> 0:26:08.240 Times, his own mouth. 0:26:08.200 --> 0:26:12.640 The Yes, his own mouth, the Jewish Anti Defamation League, 0:26:12.880 --> 0:26:15.400 I believe. I don't know if the Southern Poverty Law 0:26:15.400 --> 0:26:17.600 Center actually tracked him or not, but this guy has 0:26:17.760 --> 0:26:23.320 definitely been identified as somebody who is has was a 0:26:23.400 --> 0:26:30.280 longtime contributor to white nationalist groups, specifically the Aryan Nations 0:26:30.600 --> 0:26:33.560 out of Idaho, which is one of the original white 0:26:33.640 --> 0:26:37.800 hate groups in the United States. That's right, here's the 0:26:37.880 --> 0:26:42.000 problem with that. This is the guy who invented sea monkeys. 0:26:43.920 --> 0:26:47.200 The problem number two is that if you ever sent 0:26:47.480 --> 0:26:50.679 your money off to buy some sea monkeys, some of 0:26:50.720 --> 0:26:53.040 that money had a very good chance of having been 0:26:53.040 --> 0:26:56.600 turned around and given to the Aryan nation. And here 0:26:56.600 --> 0:26:59.359 in lies a real moral conundrum for a lot of people, 0:26:59.760 --> 0:27:00.600 under standably. 0:27:00.680 --> 0:27:04.040 So yeah, so well I didn't see did he just 0:27:04.080 --> 0:27:05.280 give money? Period? 0:27:06.000 --> 0:27:08.719 Yes, but the people are saying I gave you some 0:27:08.760 --> 0:27:11.880 of that money for sea monkeys. Who knows what dimes 0:27:11.880 --> 0:27:14.080 and nickels that I gave you went to Aryan nation. 0:27:14.400 --> 0:27:17.080 I don't want any money going to Aryan nation, so 0:27:17.359 --> 0:27:20.200 I feel horrible that my money went to you, which 0:27:20.240 --> 0:27:22.360 you turned in turn gave to. 0:27:22.400 --> 0:27:23.160 The Aryan nation. 0:27:23.800 --> 0:27:28.440 Right. However, this M five was there was a man 0:27:28.520 --> 0:27:31.879 named Richard Butler. This guy was a real piece of 0:27:31.920 --> 0:27:32.760 human garbage. 0:27:32.840 --> 0:27:34.720 He was a founder of the Aryan Nation. 0:27:35.040 --> 0:27:38.240 Yeah, he was the worst. He's not with us anymore, thankfully, 0:27:39.119 --> 0:27:42.840 but he was a very bad man and he was 0:27:42.840 --> 0:27:49.440 brought brought upon trial. And basically this M five little 0:27:51.200 --> 0:27:54.919 telescoping whip that was invented by von Braunhutt, that was 0:27:54.960 --> 0:28:01.439 specifically used that that product, and proceeds from that specifically 0:28:01.520 --> 0:28:05.399 went to a fund to help out Richard Butler. Right, 0:28:05.400 --> 0:28:06.600 so we know that for sure. 0:28:06.760 --> 0:28:11.359 Yeah, everything's going along for Harold von braun Hutt pretty 0:28:11.359 --> 0:28:15.600 swimmingly until the late eighties. Right in the late eighties, 0:28:16.359 --> 0:28:19.120 Richard Butler is brought up, along with I think fourteen 0:28:19.200 --> 0:28:23.080 or fifteen other white nationalist leaders on sedition charges basically 0:28:23.160 --> 0:28:28.960 trying to overthrow the government through plotting assassinations, trying to 0:28:29.000 --> 0:28:32.960 start a race war. They had some serious charges against them. 0:28:33.200 --> 0:28:36.040 They were eventually acquitted of these charges, but as part 0:28:36.080 --> 0:28:40.560 of this defense fund. In the Aryan Nation newsletter, Richard 0:28:40.640 --> 0:28:45.520 Butler talks about the Cyoga agent M five as a 0:28:45.560 --> 0:28:49.640 great you know, a great tool for every Aryan nationalist 0:28:49.680 --> 0:28:53.160 to have a great weapon and defense mechanism. 0:28:53.360 --> 0:28:54.720 And if you. 0:28:55.000 --> 0:28:58.600 Order this thing on the order form, write the letters 0:28:58.640 --> 0:29:02.200 a n for Arian and the inventor of this project 0:29:02.640 --> 0:29:06.200 product has pledged that twenty five of those sixty dollars 0:29:06.400 --> 0:29:09.120 will be given to my defense fund. So now, all 0:29:09.120 --> 0:29:11.640 of a sudden, for the first time ever, the guy 0:29:11.640 --> 0:29:13.959 who invented sea monkeys is tied to the guy who 0:29:14.080 --> 0:29:16.000 founded the Aryan Nation. 0:29:17.840 --> 0:29:18.400 Hate group. 0:29:19.200 --> 0:29:21.400 Yeah, and this was just like the beginning of the 0:29:21.440 --> 0:29:24.320 can of worms, which he did not invent the can 0:29:24.320 --> 0:29:27.080 of worms, but he should have. It was a beginning 0:29:27.080 --> 0:29:30.960 of that being open because, like you said, late eighties, 0:29:31.000 --> 0:29:33.680 what was an eighty eight I think? And the Washington 0:29:33.720 --> 0:29:36.520 Post basically got a hold of this story, did some 0:29:36.600 --> 0:29:40.840 investigating and found that he was involved in quote, some 0:29:40.880 --> 0:29:44.560 of the most extreme racist and anti Semitic organizations in 0:29:44.720 --> 0:29:49.840 the country. But here's the deal. There are quotes from 0:29:49.880 --> 0:29:55.160 his mouth that say things about inscrutable, slanty Korean eyes 0:29:56.000 --> 0:29:59.920 when dealing with Korean shop owners, and talking about Jews 0:30:00.320 --> 0:30:05.720 and black people, like literal quotes. Yet when he's finally contacted, 0:30:05.920 --> 0:30:09.080 this great article that we kind of started with was 0:30:09.120 --> 0:30:12.480 when he was still alive, he would deny that this 0:30:12.720 --> 0:30:16.600 was that this was him, right, and but not try 0:30:16.600 --> 0:30:18.640 and clear it up or anything. Basically just say that's 0:30:18.640 --> 0:30:23.640 a bunch of bunk. Where there were news letters written 0:30:23.680 --> 0:30:27.560 for an organization called the National Anti Zionist Institute, written 0:30:27.560 --> 0:30:31.880 by one Hendrick von Braun. But the return address was 0:30:31.920 --> 0:30:33.720 the same PO box that you sent off to get 0:30:33.720 --> 0:30:34.360 sea monkeys. 0:30:35.200 --> 0:30:38.480 Yeah, sea monkey like paraphernalia still today, same address. 0:30:38.760 --> 0:30:41.000 So it's not very Yeah it's in Maryland, which is 0:30:41.040 --> 0:30:44.640 where he lived. So he wasn't like covering his tracks 0:30:44.720 --> 0:30:45.360 very well at all. 0:30:45.920 --> 0:30:50.000 So he so all that started that Washington Post expose 0:30:50.040 --> 0:30:54.480 a specifically also came out of a property dispute. He 0:30:55.000 --> 0:30:57.320 later claimed that all of these were lies and that 0:30:57.360 --> 0:31:00.000 they were drummed up by somebody who's in a property 0:31:00.080 --> 0:31:02.600 dispute with I think there was a developer who was 0:31:02.680 --> 0:31:04.840 encroaching on his land and he was suing them, and 0:31:04.880 --> 0:31:07.040 I think he said that the developer had brought all 0:31:07.080 --> 0:31:07.480 this up. 0:31:07.760 --> 0:31:08.520 The thing is. 0:31:08.400 --> 0:31:11.520 Whether the developer exposed it or not or tip the 0:31:11.640 --> 0:31:14.880 Washington Post after this or not. This is already like 0:31:15.840 --> 0:31:20.880 pretty well known in the toy industry and pretty well documented. 0:31:20.920 --> 0:31:24.960 Like it wasn't just that this Harold von Braunhutt gave 0:31:25.160 --> 0:31:29.840 money to the Aryan nation, like he would go to 0:31:30.040 --> 0:31:34.480 their annual rally in Idaho and light the cross himself. 0:31:35.080 --> 0:31:39.560 He would he would speak at some of their their 0:31:40.040 --> 0:31:42.680 conferences and apparently not very well received. 0:31:42.720 --> 0:31:45.479 I thought, that's pretty funny speaker. 0:31:45.800 --> 0:31:46.920 No, he would. 0:31:46.960 --> 0:31:48.720 He would kind of go off on topics that the 0:31:49.000 --> 0:31:53.000 Aryans weren't particularly interested in, like numerology or the pyramids, 0:31:53.080 --> 0:31:56.520 or how it all tied together. But the thing is 0:31:56.960 --> 0:31:59.640 he had a lot of money and he was apparently 0:31:59.720 --> 0:32:02.200 quite willing to give it. Now, no one has we 0:32:02.240 --> 0:32:05.120 have to say, no one has ever documented a penny 0:32:06.320 --> 0:32:09.959 that was given to the Arian Nation. The closest thing 0:32:10.000 --> 0:32:12.840 to a smoking gun is that newsletter from Richard Butler 0:32:13.080 --> 0:32:15.760 saying that the inventor of this is pledged twenty five 0:32:15.800 --> 0:32:19.120 dollars per But the very fact that he was basically 0:32:19.160 --> 0:32:23.720 allowed into the orbit of Richard Butler himself strongly suggests 0:32:23.760 --> 0:32:27.360 that he actually followed through on those campaign pledges and 0:32:27.480 --> 0:32:32.640 legal defense von pledges. And apparently a former spokesman for 0:32:32.760 --> 0:32:36.360 the Area Nation who is now a reformed racist, he says, 0:32:37.760 --> 0:32:41.240 spoke out about Harold von Brown Hutt and said he 0:32:41.280 --> 0:32:43.160 didn't know exactly how much he gave, but he gave 0:32:43.200 --> 0:32:45.840 a lot, and he gave pretty frequently when he was asked. 0:32:46.640 --> 0:32:49.920 Right. So things get a little weirder here because it 0:32:50.000 --> 0:32:55.360 turns out that von Bronhutt was actually Jewish. He was 0:32:55.400 --> 0:33:00.480 born to Jennette Cohen and Edward Bronhutt, not vonn Bhut. 0:33:01.040 --> 0:33:05.920 Out of that little Vaughan to I guess germanize him, 0:33:06.200 --> 0:33:08.680 I guess so. And he was born in New York 0:33:08.680 --> 0:33:11.480 City on March thirty first, nineteen twenty six as Harold 0:33:11.560 --> 0:33:16.160 Nathan brown Hut. And if you know anything about Aryan 0:33:16.240 --> 0:33:18.320 Nations or any of those groups, they don't take kindly 0:33:18.440 --> 0:33:22.120 to a Jewish guy, even if he's like rebukes that 0:33:22.240 --> 0:33:25.520 to being a member. But like you said, he had 0:33:25.560 --> 0:33:28.480 a lot of dough and that's basically why everyone thinks 0:33:28.520 --> 0:33:30.600 they allowed him to stay on as a member. 0:33:30.960 --> 0:33:31.200 Yeah. 0:33:31.320 --> 0:33:34.320 So that The nineteen eighty eight Washington Post article did 0:33:34.360 --> 0:33:36.360 a couple of things. One out of the inventor of 0:33:36.400 --> 0:33:41.240 sea monkeys as an Aryan white supremacist, or I should 0:33:41.240 --> 0:33:43.960 say just a white supremacist, he was an Aran. It 0:33:44.040 --> 0:33:46.440 also outed him as a non Aryan, as a Jewish 0:33:46.480 --> 0:33:50.400 person born Jewish to Jewish parents about as Jewish as 0:33:50.440 --> 0:33:54.640 you can possibly get. Aside from being a practicing Jew. Right, 0:33:55.080 --> 0:34:00.400 so he he was outed in this in this Washington 0:34:00.400 --> 0:34:04.600 Post article like two times over, so everybody was mad 0:34:04.640 --> 0:34:06.440 at him from either side. 0:34:06.520 --> 0:34:06.720 Right. 0:34:07.640 --> 0:34:10.000 The thing is like, even after, I guess, the Area 0:34:10.120 --> 0:34:14.560 Nation released a press release about this, saying that they 0:34:14.560 --> 0:34:17.319 were disappointed to find out this guy that they were 0:34:17.360 --> 0:34:20.960 friends with was actually Jewish, but he was not kicked 0:34:21.000 --> 0:34:25.799 out of their circle. He stayed apparently as intracted as 0:34:25.800 --> 0:34:29.359 he was before and still was was a part of 0:34:29.400 --> 0:34:32.239 the organization's conferences and stuff like that. 0:34:32.800 --> 0:34:35.600 Yeah, and he was. It wasn't just the Aryan Nations. 0:34:35.640 --> 0:34:40.040 He In nineteen eighty five, The Washington Post says that 0:34:40.239 --> 0:34:43.680 US Attorney Thomas Bauer there was a weapons case in 0:34:43.760 --> 0:34:47.840 nineteen eighty five against a member of the clan Grand 0:34:47.960 --> 0:34:49.719 Dragon Dale Reusch. 0:34:50.040 --> 0:34:52.480 Yeah, it was in nineteen eighty I think that the 0:34:52.560 --> 0:34:54.080 transaction happened. 0:34:55.680 --> 0:34:58.920 Okay, but the weapons case was in nineteen eighty five, gotcha, 0:34:59.120 --> 0:35:05.240 and Van Brounhutt basically loan the guy twelve thousand dollars 0:35:05.640 --> 0:35:08.680 so he could buy more than eighty firearms. Yeah, like, 0:35:08.760 --> 0:35:10.200 here go buy a bunch of guns. 0:35:10.680 --> 0:35:14.000 Well, okay, yes, and this is a Grand Wizard of 0:35:14.000 --> 0:35:17.080 the Klan I believe right, yes, So the reason I 0:35:17.120 --> 0:35:19.960 pointed out that it happened in nineteen eighty the year 0:35:20.000 --> 0:35:23.400 before the Washington Post had drummed up in that nineteen 0:35:23.400 --> 0:35:26.279 eighty eight article. The year before he had paid like 0:35:26.320 --> 0:35:29.880 thirteen hundred dollars for his parents' graves in a Jewish 0:35:29.880 --> 0:35:33.799 cemetery to be kept up in perpetuity. So this is like, 0:35:33.880 --> 0:35:36.920 this is this weird dual life. This guy is living 0:35:36.960 --> 0:35:40.719 like born and raised Jewish, respecting his Jewish parents funeral 0:35:40.760 --> 0:35:45.360 wishes and burial wishes, and then months later helping a 0:35:45.400 --> 0:35:50.440 grand Wizard of the KKK buy eighty three firearms and 0:35:50.480 --> 0:35:52.960 then taking possession of the firearms himself until. 0:35:52.719 --> 0:35:53.920 The loan was paid back. 0:35:55.120 --> 0:35:55.800 It's crazy. 0:35:56.360 --> 0:35:59.200 It is a little crazy. It's quite surprising actually too. 0:35:59.280 --> 0:36:01.279 I mean that's like a one two punch. 0:36:01.000 --> 0:36:01.200 You know. 0:36:02.120 --> 0:36:05.680 Yeah, So he didn't. Actually, he would do licensing deals 0:36:05.760 --> 0:36:08.600 over the years. That's how he ran his business. Probably 0:36:08.600 --> 0:36:12.399 smartly to do that, if you ask me. But over 0:36:12.440 --> 0:36:14.840 the years have been many many companies that held the 0:36:14.880 --> 0:36:17.520 license for sea monkeys that he partnered with, and they 0:36:17.560 --> 0:36:21.040 all kind of had different reactions. That was one called 0:36:21.360 --> 0:36:26.000 Larmie Limited, one called Basic Fun, one called Educational Insights. 0:36:26.280 --> 0:36:29.399 There may have been more today it resides with Big 0:36:29.400 --> 0:36:34.040 Time Toys. But this article that we dug up from 0:36:34.040 --> 0:36:36.040 when he was still alive, basically, this guy gets in 0:36:36.080 --> 0:36:38.560 touch with a lot of these people, and some of 0:36:38.600 --> 0:36:41.960 them said they believe the story that it was just 0:36:42.239 --> 0:36:46.520 some story that this angry neighbor cooked up to slander 0:36:46.520 --> 0:36:50.640 his name. Other ones have said, yeah, you know what, 0:36:52.680 --> 0:36:56.239 everyone kind of knew about it, but we're not gonna 0:36:56.640 --> 0:36:59.040 we're not gonna take that out on the Sea Monkeys, right, 0:37:00.800 --> 0:37:02.520 And he was a nice guy to us, and what 0:37:02.600 --> 0:37:04.520 he does in his private time is no one's business. 0:37:04.640 --> 0:37:04.879 Yeah. 0:37:04.880 --> 0:37:06.759 The thing is is, like some of the people that 0:37:06.840 --> 0:37:10.040 he was doing business with were Jewish, and we're taking 0:37:10.200 --> 0:37:12.560 some of the things he was doing in his private 0:37:12.640 --> 0:37:15.960 life personally themselves. Like the guy who was the president 0:37:16.000 --> 0:37:19.600 of Basic Fund, that's one of the worst names for 0:37:19.640 --> 0:37:23.240 a toy company based It's like, don't get too excited, 0:37:23.280 --> 0:37:24.480 this is just Basic Fund. 0:37:24.520 --> 0:37:26.840 That they had a spinoff company called Minimal Enjoyment. 0:37:27.120 --> 0:37:27.279 Right. 0:37:28.000 --> 0:37:31.880 He he got the license or his company got the 0:37:31.960 --> 0:37:36.200 license for Sea Monkeys to handle distributing and marketing sea monkeys, 0:37:36.560 --> 0:37:41.880 and he apparently asked von Braunhutt, like, is this true, 0:37:42.040 --> 0:37:44.680 and von Brounhutt told him no, there's this developer in 0:37:44.719 --> 0:37:47.320 a dispute with who's like trying to drum up bad press. 0:37:47.440 --> 0:37:48.280 They're all lies. 0:37:48.719 --> 0:37:51.799 Well, within a year, The New York Times wrote an 0:37:51.880 --> 0:37:56.240 article about that annual rally at the Area Nation Compound 0:37:56.239 --> 0:37:59.880 in Idaho and said that Harold von Bronhut had been 0:38:00.080 --> 0:38:02.440 speaker there. So the guy from Basic Fun was like, 0:38:02.840 --> 0:38:04.960 that's it. I'm done with your contracts broken. 0:38:06.560 --> 0:38:09.240 Yeah. I mean that did happen sometimes over the years 0:38:10.480 --> 0:38:14.080 and other times, you know people, I guess money talks, 0:38:14.480 --> 0:38:18.200 so they were willing to put up with it. Yeah, yep, 0:38:18.680 --> 0:38:22.000 it's crazy. He you know, like when he was called personally, 0:38:22.040 --> 0:38:23.799 he said, I don't have to defend myself to you 0:38:23.880 --> 0:38:27.640 or anyone else. I'm hanging up right. So I guess 0:38:27.640 --> 0:38:31.960 it was a time when, you know, pre Internet, pre 0:38:32.080 --> 0:38:34.680 social media, where you could kind of get away with 0:38:34.719 --> 0:38:36.000 stuff like this a little easier. 0:38:36.520 --> 0:38:39.400 Yeah, I mean, like he was, Yeah, it was just 0:38:39.440 --> 0:38:41.160 an open secret. And I think, like you said, I 0:38:41.160 --> 0:38:43.279 think you hit the nail on the head man when 0:38:43.320 --> 0:38:46.239 there's like this much money involved, and when you're talking 0:38:46.280 --> 0:38:52.200 about a brand where it's just like an beloved American icon. Yeah, 0:38:52.239 --> 0:38:55.400 like people just look the other way on the fact 0:38:55.400 --> 0:38:59.320 that you're a white supremacist. You know, it's it's bizarre. 0:38:59.360 --> 0:39:02.600 But apparently this is a story of how the world 0:39:02.640 --> 0:39:03.760 works in that respect. 0:39:04.120 --> 0:39:07.000 Yeah, it was interesting for this one article I think 0:39:07.040 --> 0:39:10.680 from the early two thousands. From the all was that 0:39:11.080 --> 0:39:13.080 oh no, no, no, that was from twenty eleven. The 0:39:13.120 --> 0:39:16.400 other one was oh yeah, yeah, that was when he 0:39:16.440 --> 0:39:21.920 had currently the licensee was Educational Insights, and they at 0:39:21.920 --> 0:39:23.799 the time it was funny to go back and read 0:39:23.840 --> 0:39:26.520 this that they were trying to update the image for 0:39:26.680 --> 0:39:30.720 the sea monkeys. Yeah yeah, and they had like these drawers. 0:39:30.719 --> 0:39:33.200 They hired some big advertising guy and marketing guy, and 0:39:33.239 --> 0:39:35.919 he came in and was basically like, man like kids 0:39:35.920 --> 0:39:41.160 these days, they don't want these little skinny, pot bellied King, Queen, 0:39:42.040 --> 0:39:45.400 Prince and princess family. They want superheroes. So he buffed 0:39:45.440 --> 0:39:48.359 them up and put capes on them and made a 0:39:48.400 --> 0:39:51.640 new jingle and they never went with any of that stuff. 0:39:51.680 --> 0:39:53.120 It kind of all went in the waste basket. 0:39:53.160 --> 0:39:53.440 I think. 0:39:53.600 --> 0:39:55.600 Well, one new thing did come out of it, and 0:39:56.040 --> 0:39:59.400 von Or Harold brown Hut had a patent on it 0:39:59.400 --> 0:40:02.160 was one of his li patents. It was a watch 0:40:02.480 --> 0:40:06.200 that you could inject a couple of live sea monkeys 0:40:06.200 --> 0:40:08.879 into and they would live in there for twenty four 0:40:08.920 --> 0:40:12.400 hours before I guess either they died or if you 0:40:12.480 --> 0:40:14.560 could suck them back out and put them back in 0:40:14.600 --> 0:40:17.000 their aquarium. But you could walk around with your two 0:40:17.040 --> 0:40:19.960 favorite or luckiest sea monkeys for the day and tell 0:40:20.080 --> 0:40:22.719 time as well. So that was there was at least 0:40:22.719 --> 0:40:25.480 one thing that came out of that updating. But if 0:40:25.520 --> 0:40:27.160 you go back and look, if you look at those 0:40:27.200 --> 0:40:29.359 you're like, this is pretty lame. And you go back 0:40:29.400 --> 0:40:31.960 and look today at the sea monkey packaging, it is 0:40:32.000 --> 0:40:34.239 basically back to how it was like in that Joe 0:40:34.400 --> 0:40:38.200 Orlando style. But if you do want to watch some 0:40:38.280 --> 0:40:43.120 business people do some tap dancing, it's really interesting. Read 0:40:43.120 --> 0:40:45.919 this article. It's called the Sea Monkeys and the White Supremacist. 0:40:46.000 --> 0:40:48.720 It was in the La Times on October first, two thousand, 0:40:49.040 --> 0:40:51.799 written by Tamar Brought, who did a pretty good job 0:40:51.880 --> 0:40:57.200 of like just some good old fashioned like footwork or 0:40:57.320 --> 0:41:03.279 legwork going to pound the pound the beat with the. 0:41:03.680 --> 0:41:05.479 Footwork, sniff him off the case. 0:41:05.600 --> 0:41:06.640 You know what I'm saying. 0:41:06.800 --> 0:41:08.400 All Right, Well, let's take another break and we're going 0:41:08.440 --> 0:41:10.239 to come back and we're talking about We're going to 0:41:10.320 --> 0:41:13.600 talk about where things stand today in the fight over 0:41:13.640 --> 0:41:15.640 the rights and the fortune of the sea monkeys. 0:41:15.920 --> 0:41:19.319 If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just 0:41:19.560 --> 0:41:29.320 listen to JH sh suffuse stuff. 0:41:29.440 --> 0:41:45.480 You s No, all right, so we know what happened. Actually, 0:41:45.480 --> 0:41:47.360 how did he die? I didn't even see that. 0:41:48.120 --> 0:41:52.040 I didn't see that either. He died in two thousand 0:41:52.080 --> 0:41:54.680 and three, but I'm not sure why. All right, So 0:41:54.760 --> 0:41:56.640 he died, Yeah, that's true. 0:41:57.000 --> 0:42:03.040 But he left behind his wife, Yolanda Signorelli von Braunhutt. 0:42:03.120 --> 0:42:04.080 Did you look her up? 0:42:04.360 --> 0:42:08.440 Oh? Yeah, okay, yeah she was. She was an actress. 0:42:10.200 --> 0:42:13.200 She was sort of a sort of like a pin up, 0:42:13.239 --> 0:42:15.320 bombshell b movie actress. 0:42:16.440 --> 0:42:20.279 It's fairsh I had also seen her movies as described 0:42:20.320 --> 0:42:21.839 as adult films as well. 0:42:22.719 --> 0:42:26.200 Sure, she was in a movie. I got to see 0:42:26.200 --> 0:42:26.520 this one. 0:42:26.560 --> 0:42:30.920 It's called Love After Death and it's a softcore zombie 0:42:31.160 --> 0:42:36.360 flick from the sixties. Yeah, but yes, she was a 0:42:36.400 --> 0:42:39.120 pretty interesting person in her own right as well. 0:42:39.480 --> 0:42:42.000 Yeah, and she says for her as far as the 0:42:42.880 --> 0:42:46.880 Aryan Nation stuff. She says, like, I never knew and 0:42:47.000 --> 0:42:49.480 saw this side of him. So I don't know if 0:42:49.520 --> 0:42:53.680 she's being on the level or if she's just kind 0:42:53.680 --> 0:42:56.799 of quashing this and covering for him. It was kind 0:42:56.800 --> 0:42:57.440 of not clear to. 0:42:57.400 --> 0:42:58.160 Me I saw. 0:42:58.320 --> 0:42:59.719 I don't know if it was in that New York 0:42:59.760 --> 0:43:03.320 Times article or in the nineteen eighty eight Washington Post article. 0:43:03.719 --> 0:43:06.880 But his first wife was contacted and interviewed for it, 0:43:06.920 --> 0:43:09.800 and she was like, what are you guys talking about? 0:43:09.960 --> 0:43:10.280 Really? 0:43:10.520 --> 0:43:10.880 Yeah? 0:43:10.920 --> 0:43:13.880 So who knows. Maybe he did just keep the He 0:43:14.040 --> 0:43:17.560 was clearly somebody who could compartmentalize the different parts of 0:43:17.560 --> 0:43:22.759 his personality. So maybe he really did just leave the 0:43:22.800 --> 0:43:23.600 wives out of it. 0:43:24.239 --> 0:43:26.640 Man, how could you not know something? Right? That's crazy? 0:43:26.719 --> 0:43:28.880 Just going to Idaho on my yearly trip. 0:43:29.120 --> 0:43:32.160 Yeah, that's weird. He always goes to Idaho in the 0:43:32.320 --> 0:43:34.279 Aryan Nation assembles. 0:43:34.600 --> 0:43:40.799 All right. So, Yolanda Signora Levan bron Hut lived and 0:43:40.880 --> 0:43:44.040 I think still lives in or at least as of 0:43:44.080 --> 0:43:46.799 two years ago when this article came out, in the 0:43:46.840 --> 0:43:53.600 Potomac River estate in southern Maryland. But she is she's 0:43:53.880 --> 0:43:58.400 she's she's broke. Yeah, basically, she has no electricity, no 0:43:58.480 --> 0:44:02.840 running water, and she is and been in illegal battle 0:44:03.440 --> 0:44:08.960 with Big Time Toys and their chief executive Sam Harwell 0:44:09.640 --> 0:44:15.799 for basically several years, trying to get money because Big 0:44:15.800 --> 0:44:18.200 Time Toy says, this is our company now. 0:44:18.440 --> 0:44:21.439 Yeah, Big Time Toys sounds like I'd be nervous about 0:44:21.440 --> 0:44:24.000 going into business with them. I'm more of a basic 0:44:24.120 --> 0:44:27.960 fun guy. Big Time Toys sounds like they're moving too 0:44:28.000 --> 0:44:30.719 fast for me, you know what I mean? Yeah, so yeah, So, 0:44:31.880 --> 0:44:35.840 Yolanda Brown Hutt has She's got kind of like a 0:44:35.880 --> 0:44:39.520 great gardens thing going on right now against her will. 0:44:39.520 --> 0:44:42.640 This is not something she's happy about at all. And 0:44:42.800 --> 0:44:46.319 her position is, as far as The Times tells it 0:44:46.360 --> 0:44:51.160 is that she engaged in a licensing deal, which is 0:44:51.360 --> 0:44:55.120 how sea monkeys have been produced basically since the beginning, 0:44:56.080 --> 0:44:58.680 with a company with that company, Big Time Toys, where 0:44:58.719 --> 0:45:04.040 they would handle the packaging and the distribution, and her company, 0:45:04.080 --> 0:45:09.000 her own little company, would handle making the actual sea 0:45:09.040 --> 0:45:14.040 monkeys that were that were put into the packaging that 0:45:14.120 --> 0:45:17.240 Big Time Toys sold. Right, So, Big Time Toys would 0:45:17.320 --> 0:45:20.399 buy the sea monkeys that they would put into the 0:45:20.520 --> 0:45:23.520 packages and then would turn around and sell to the public. 0:45:23.760 --> 0:45:25.880 That was the arrangement initially. 0:45:25.760 --> 0:45:29.680 Right, So we have the secret formula that no one 0:45:29.719 --> 0:45:31.640 else has seemed to be been able to crack. 0:45:31.960 --> 0:45:33.120 This is Yolanda talking. 0:45:33.239 --> 0:45:35.200 Yeah, should I have done my Jolana voice? 0:45:35.280 --> 0:45:36.000 Yeah, let's hear it. 0:45:36.719 --> 0:45:37.200 I don't know what. 0:45:37.239 --> 0:45:39.919 She sounds like, high pitched Italian stereotype. 0:45:40.400 --> 0:45:40.800 Let's hear it. 0:45:41.360 --> 0:45:44.560 No, no, no, she It would have been like three 0:45:44.600 --> 0:45:46.640 different groups of people if yeah, yeah, I think you wi. 0:45:48.719 --> 0:45:50.919 She basically said, we have the secret formula, the only 0:45:50.920 --> 0:45:53.280 one that works that can keep these things alive. Everyone 0:45:53.280 --> 0:45:56.120 else has tried and failed, and so we will sell 0:45:56.160 --> 0:45:58.520 these to you and you can do everything else and 0:45:58.560 --> 0:46:00.960 cut me a check. And there was also a side 0:46:01.000 --> 0:46:05.600 deal that said you can buy this company, including the 0:46:05.640 --> 0:46:09.480 secret formula, for five million bucks up front and then 0:46:09.520 --> 0:46:13.600 another five million and installments, and so Big Time basically 0:46:14.200 --> 0:46:17.279 called her up a few years ago, probably about five 0:46:17.360 --> 0:46:19.040 years ago at this point, if my math is right, 0:46:19.520 --> 0:46:22.239 and said, you know what, all these payments we've been 0:46:22.280 --> 0:46:26.399 making to you for the licensing deal, we just kind 0:46:26.400 --> 0:46:29.880 of consider that layaway and as far as we're concerned, 0:46:29.880 --> 0:46:30.880 we own sea monkeys. 0:46:30.920 --> 0:46:31.120 Now. 0:46:31.280 --> 0:46:35.160 Yeah, we've reached that five million dollar point. So there ares. 0:46:35.120 --> 0:46:38.000 Which ostensibly should not have been that money. It should 0:46:38.000 --> 0:46:41.040 have been separate payments, if I understand this correctly. 0:46:41.760 --> 0:46:43.560 But I mean, when somebody does that, what are you 0:46:43.600 --> 0:46:45.359 going to do? You got to go see them, right, 0:46:45.800 --> 0:46:48.520 And that's what they're doing, and they're bleeding this lady dry, 0:46:48.600 --> 0:46:52.320 at least as far as this New York Times profile 0:46:52.440 --> 0:46:56.880 is concerned. And I mean, if you get into a 0:46:56.920 --> 0:46:58.920 fight like that and you don't have the money, you 0:46:58.960 --> 0:47:03.600 can lose. So this could be a sad end to 0:47:03.800 --> 0:47:08.640 the Sea Monkey saga. Because here's the other problem. You 0:47:08.719 --> 0:47:10.799 might be saying to yourself, well, why doesn't she just 0:47:10.920 --> 0:47:12.920 not sell them the sea monkeys anymore? 0:47:13.160 --> 0:47:13.759 Well she did. 0:47:13.920 --> 0:47:16.160 She stopped when they stopped making payments and said they 0:47:16.200 --> 0:47:18.759 owned the Sea Monkey brand. And it turned out that 0:47:18.840 --> 0:47:23.560 in this court case that big big, big Time Toys 0:47:24.680 --> 0:47:28.680 have been buying knockoff sea monkeys from China, and then 0:47:28.719 --> 0:47:30.719 that's what they were putting into the Sea Monkey thing. 0:47:30.800 --> 0:47:34.880 So apparently if you're buying, if you buy currently a 0:47:35.080 --> 0:47:39.959 Sea Monkey package, you're getting Big Time Toys packaging and 0:47:41.000 --> 0:47:44.640 Chinese knockoff sea monkey packets. 0:47:44.520 --> 0:47:48.719 Which don't work. Apparently, I went and looked at Amazon reviews, 0:47:49.440 --> 0:47:52.839 and almost all of them for all the products said 0:47:54.080 --> 0:47:56.640 none of them hatched, or they hatched for like a day. 0:47:57.239 --> 0:47:59.600 These things stink. When I was a kid, they worked. 0:48:00.400 --> 0:48:04.279 So it's weird that it's sort of ironic that they 0:48:04.360 --> 0:48:09.160 ended up creating a special breed essentially that worked, and 0:48:09.239 --> 0:48:12.160 that ended up being there undoing. Because in court and 0:48:12.200 --> 0:48:16.239 the affidavit, the leader, this Harwell guy, whose wife, by 0:48:16.239 --> 0:48:19.239 the way, is ahead. She's a speaker of the House 0:48:19.280 --> 0:48:22.960 of the Tennessee House of Representatives. Yeah, they're a power 0:48:23.000 --> 0:48:25.960 family all the way around and not to be trifled with. 0:48:26.760 --> 0:48:30.280 In his affidavit, he says he outsourced the sea monkeys 0:48:30.280 --> 0:48:34.319 of China and says there are seven recognized species of 0:48:34.800 --> 0:48:39.399 our Timia brine shrimp and this is not one of them. 0:48:39.760 --> 0:48:44.640 So because they had created their own species, it ended 0:48:44.719 --> 0:48:47.560 up being there undoing at court. It looks like because 0:48:47.560 --> 0:48:52.040 it doesn't officially exist as a real species that these 0:48:52.080 --> 0:48:52.760 guys are getting. 0:48:53.120 --> 0:48:55.839 Yeah, but I'm pretty sure he got a patent on 0:48:56.000 --> 0:48:58.759 the species that they made. 0:48:59.000 --> 0:49:00.520 Well, no, that's what I'm saying that. But he's not 0:49:00.560 --> 0:49:04.000 getting that species. Oh, I see, he's getting these Well 0:49:04.000 --> 0:49:07.600 they're not knockoffs their mother Nature's own. Sure, sure, China, 0:49:08.200 --> 0:49:09.279 but they're not the ones that. 0:49:09.239 --> 0:49:10.880 Are working, right, I got youa. 0:49:11.040 --> 0:49:11.920 So it's just a mess. 0:49:12.280 --> 0:49:15.160 But then still doesn't that like raise questions about how 0:49:15.200 --> 0:49:17.200 you could use the Sea Monkey's name or. 0:49:17.320 --> 0:49:18.200 That's what I wondered. 0:49:18.640 --> 0:49:21.200 But I guess if they had the license to use 0:49:21.200 --> 0:49:23.360 the Sea Monkey's name because they were in charge of 0:49:23.400 --> 0:49:28.120 packaging and distribution, maybe then yeah, I guess they could say, well, 0:49:28.120 --> 0:49:30.200 we're not going to use the official ones any longer, 0:49:30.200 --> 0:49:31.560 We're going to use these natural ones. 0:49:31.719 --> 0:49:32.920 Man, what a mess. 0:49:33.040 --> 0:49:35.240 Well, and it's a mess too because you're like, oh, 0:49:35.280 --> 0:49:39.279 do I root for the side of this guy who 0:49:39.400 --> 0:49:44.120 was a white nationalist, but you know, his wife says 0:49:44.120 --> 0:49:46.720 she didn't know anything about that, and she's going broke 0:49:47.160 --> 0:49:49.920 and has been basically had this company stolen from her. 0:49:50.200 --> 0:49:52.560 It seems like, yeah, it's just I don't know, I 0:49:52.600 --> 0:49:53.319 don't know what to think. 0:49:53.480 --> 0:49:56.600 Or do you root for the guys who are apparently 0:49:56.640 --> 0:50:00.200 stealing the company fake waido of the white national. 0:50:00.320 --> 0:50:01.640 Y for big time toys? 0:50:01.840 --> 0:50:03.879 Yeah? You know what. I predict that, Chuck. 0:50:04.000 --> 0:50:07.560 I predict that Sea Monkeys the brand will ultimately rise 0:50:07.600 --> 0:50:10.960 about this that it will. It will survive this somehow 0:50:11.120 --> 0:50:14.160 and still be around twenty thirty years from now. 0:50:14.320 --> 0:50:15.480 The sea monkeys will take over. 0:50:16.680 --> 0:50:21.480 Yeah, they will eventually overthrow the human race, like the 0:50:21.560 --> 0:50:25.240 Arians plotted to overthrow the US government. What a story, 0:50:25.680 --> 0:50:28.279 It's quite a story. That's a good one, man. Thanks 0:50:28.280 --> 0:50:31.480 for digging this up. Sure, well, if you want to 0:50:31.520 --> 0:50:34.720 know more about sea monkeys, just start digging around, pulling 0:50:34.760 --> 0:50:37.440 at the loose threads. You're gonna find some interesting stuff. 0:50:37.920 --> 0:50:40.520 And since I said interesting stuff, that means it's time 0:50:40.560 --> 0:50:41.719 friends for a listener mail. 0:50:44.480 --> 0:50:49.520 I'm gonna call this pomp Pei Pompeiian lemons. Okay, is 0:50:49.560 --> 0:50:50.160 that how you would say it? 0:50:50.239 --> 0:50:53.120 Pompey in Yeah? I thought that was beautiful. 0:50:53.160 --> 0:50:55.640 All right, long time listener, first time emailer. Guys recently 0:50:55.640 --> 0:50:59.759 listened to the Pompei show. Very informative. Uh and I 0:51:00.040 --> 0:51:01.520 to be a tour guide in Europe and led close 0:51:01.520 --> 0:51:05.000 to fifteen tours on the Amalfi Coast, Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius. 0:51:05.640 --> 0:51:08.640 I listened to Josh experience with the lemons. They do, 0:51:08.719 --> 0:51:10.719 in fact grow to be the size of your head. However, 0:51:11.480 --> 0:51:15.799 those gigantic lemons are actually called sedri and are more 0:51:15.800 --> 0:51:16.800 for show than anything. 0:51:17.080 --> 0:51:18.960 They're called sedri the end of day in it. 0:51:20.480 --> 0:51:22.640 If you ever cut one and a half, the inside 0:51:23.239 --> 0:51:26.160 is actually about the size of a normal lemon. The 0:51:26.239 --> 0:51:29.200 rind can be a few inches thick, and boy are 0:51:29.200 --> 0:51:32.560 they bitter. Definitely not something you keep around for lemonade. 0:51:32.920 --> 0:51:34.160 Just something I wanted to share. 0:51:34.680 --> 0:51:36.440 Thanks for ruining everything for me. 0:51:37.640 --> 0:51:40.600 And also another thought the other day in the car, 0:51:40.719 --> 0:51:44.480 have either of you just said no when one of 0:51:44.520 --> 0:51:47.000 you asked for a commercial break. I thought it'd be 0:51:47.000 --> 0:51:51.760 funny if one of you just said, nah. 0:51:50.800 --> 0:51:54.520 We've come close. We have, haven't we I don't know. 0:51:54.760 --> 0:51:56.400 Did it not make it into an episode? 0:51:56.440 --> 0:51:59.080 It might not? Have we have and we just edited 0:51:59.080 --> 0:52:01.520 that part out and kept going. I think. 0:52:01.880 --> 0:52:04.720 Well that is for Matt McDonald, who is a software 0:52:04.760 --> 0:52:06.440 developer at Neocloud. 0:52:07.000 --> 0:52:07.960 Thanks a lot, Matt. 0:52:08.440 --> 0:52:11.160 I think I was kind of disappointed to read that 0:52:11.239 --> 0:52:15.040 email originally, but whatever, I guess you got to just 0:52:15.080 --> 0:52:16.359 live with reality, right. 0:52:16.480 --> 0:52:17.720 You've made an enemy today. 0:52:19.600 --> 0:52:20.720 If you want to get. 0:52:20.560 --> 0:52:23.439 In touch with us and ruin our reality like Matt did, 0:52:23.680 --> 0:52:26.000 you can send all of us, including Jerry, an email 0:52:26.040 --> 0:52:29.040 to Stuff Podcasts at Houstuffworks dot com and has always 0:52:29.080 --> 0:52:31.319 joined us at our home on the web. Stuffishould Know 0:52:31.400 --> 0:52:35.560 dot Com. 0:52:35.160 --> 0:52:38.040 Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For 0:52:38.120 --> 0:52:42.319 more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, 0:52:42.440 --> 0:52:44.280 or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.