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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of

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Speaker 1: My Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow

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Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick.

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Speaker 1: And I was gonna say that it's almost Christmas time,

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Speaker 1: but I don't know exactly what day this episode is

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Speaker 1: going to be airing. We haven't fully worked that out yet.

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Speaker 1: So it's sometime within a couple of weeks of Christmas, right,

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Speaker 1: well Christmas Day, but certainly it falls within the month

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Speaker 1: of December or like the three month radius of surrounding December.

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Speaker 1: So it's Christmas, right, It's the holidays. Bells will be ringing,

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Speaker 1: meaning doorbells with deliveries because that's uh, that's the kind

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Speaker 1: of Christmas that's going on this year. Yep, yep, the

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Speaker 1: supply chain straining holiday season. Yes, um so, yeah, you

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Speaker 1: wanted to talk about some Christmas related invent chins, and

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Speaker 1: I gotta say we turned up some surprisingly weird and

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Speaker 1: funny stuff on this subject. I was pleasantly surprised with

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Speaker 1: where this went. Yeah, last year, in the Invention feed

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Speaker 1: Back when Invention was its own podcast, we focused on

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Speaker 1: some popular toys, where they came from, how they were

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Speaker 1: invented things that went under the tree. This year, all

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Speaker 1: of the inventions were discussing are things that go on

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Speaker 1: the tree? Which is uh and and yeah these It

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Speaker 1: turned out to be quite interesting. Do you have a

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Speaker 1: tree up right now, Joe? We do. It is fake.

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Speaker 1: It is made primarily of petroleum products. So, uh, what

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Speaker 1: was once ancient organisms floating in the seas have settled

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Speaker 1: down and become oil and now they are plastic and

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Speaker 1: they're in my home and they make it festive. Oh nice, Well,

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Speaker 1: we too have our tree up. It is a a

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Speaker 1: live tree, or at least one that was was alive

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Speaker 1: at some point and it was cut free from the earth.

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Speaker 1: And uh so yeah, now it is in my living

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Speaker 1: room and I run a hose in from outside to

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Speaker 1: give it more water every day or so you were

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Speaker 1: you always a live tree person or was that a transition.

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Speaker 1: I've just always been a fake tree family my whole life.

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Speaker 1: We were always a live tree family and we would

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Speaker 1: do this thing. I think this is something my family

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Speaker 1: picked up in Canada and then continue to do. And

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Speaker 1: that is for a for the tree stand. Instead of

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Speaker 1: having an actual tree stand, we had a bucket of rocks,

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Speaker 1: so you'd put the tree stump in the bucket and

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Speaker 1: then you put big sizeable rocks around it, you know,

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Speaker 1: to fill it up, but there's still space for water,

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Speaker 1: and then we'd pour water in and uh, I think

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Speaker 1: we did that till one year the tree tipped over

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Speaker 1: and rocks and water went everywhere. And then they decided, well,

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Speaker 1: let's let's see about getting an artificial tree, and then

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Speaker 1: they made the switch. But uh, I've done both here

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Speaker 1: in my own household. Um. I mean, you know, it's

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Speaker 1: it's a trade off, right like, because the there's a

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Speaker 1: nice smell to the to the fresh cut tree. Um,

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Speaker 1: but then you have to pick up the needles, you

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Speaker 1: have to inevitably do a little song on it to

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Speaker 1: make it function in your house. So I don't know,

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Speaker 1: I can go either way. I think conceptually I'm very

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Speaker 1: much a live tree person. I've just never in actuality

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Speaker 1: been one. That's that's the power of habit and the

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Speaker 1: power of family tradition, right Like, if you were to

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Speaker 1: present me these options afresh, as if you know, I'd

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Speaker 1: never celebrated Christmas before, I would definitely go live tree.

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Speaker 1: But now I think I'm going to be plastic to

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Speaker 1: the grave. I used to like the idea of doing

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Speaker 1: a small tree because if you do a small little tree,

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Speaker 1: it's less less work. Right, But now we have all

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Speaker 1: of these, We've accumulated all of these these family heirloom decorations,

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Speaker 1: so you know we've got to put those on the trees.

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Speaker 1: You gotta have a large enough tree to hold them.

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Speaker 1: That's a very good points as the ornaments that come

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Speaker 1: as Christmas gifts that people give you when they don't

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Speaker 1: know what else to give you for Christmas, as they

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Speaker 1: accumulate over the seasons, they really do start weighing down

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Speaker 1: those branches. Alright. So, like I said, everything that we're

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Speaker 1: discussing this episode, all the inventions are things that go

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Speaker 1: on a Christmas tree. So we really need to lay

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Speaker 1: the groundwork, especially for our first invention, Christmas tree lights

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Speaker 1: electric Christmas tree lights. Now we always discussed what came before. Well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, obviously we have to talk about just the

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Speaker 1: origin of the Christmas tree as much as we understand it. Um. Now,

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Speaker 1: if a couple of different ways to consider this. You know,

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Speaker 1: you can think about the the use of control fire

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Speaker 1: itself for ceremonial purposes. Uh, this has a role in

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Speaker 1: every culture but here we're talking more specifically about the

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Speaker 1: use of illumination technology combined with the form of a

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Speaker 1: tree or an actual tree. Now I know I read

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Speaker 1: a legendary account. Something tells me this this might not

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Speaker 1: be necessarily true. But a legendary account involving Martin Luther

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Speaker 1: and the origins of lighting up a Christmas tree. Um. So,

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Speaker 1: so this story, I guess would post date the invention

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Speaker 1: of the Christmas tree itself because it assumes there's already

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Speaker 1: a tree inside the house. But the story is that

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Speaker 1: Martin Luther is out wandering one night, the Protestant reformer

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Speaker 1: Martin Luther. I'm sure he's uh, he's composing in his

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Speaker 1: mind some extremely scatological screed against the pope. And then

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Speaker 1: he's wandering and he sees trees, and he sees the

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Speaker 1: stars behind the trees, twinkling and shining through the branches,

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Speaker 1: and he's like, oh, how could I recreate that at home?

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Speaker 1: And the idea he comes up with is, well, let's

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Speaker 1: put a bunch of candles in the branches of this evergreen. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: It's a beautiful story, but as far as I can tell,

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Speaker 1: it's just a story, just made up. Yeah, much like

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Speaker 1: another story, another myth concerning St. Boniface thwarting a pagan

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Speaker 1: ceremony and somehow turning it into a Christmas tree. Again.

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Speaker 1: You know, it makes for a cool origin story, but

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Speaker 1: there's nothing to it now. There's certainly you get into

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Speaker 1: the myth making about the origin of the Christmas tree. Like.

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Speaker 1: Another thing to keep in mind is that we have

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Speaker 1: a lot of what you can think of as auxiliary traditions. Uh.

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Speaker 1: For instance, in England, prior to the use of Christmas trees,

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Speaker 1: there were fifteenth and sixteenth century traditions involving bringing holly

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Speaker 1: and ivy and during the winter and doing things with

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Speaker 1: holly and ivy. They are dreadic traditions concerning mistletoe and

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Speaker 1: we've explored those on the podcast before The winter may

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Speaker 1: pole tradition has also some similarities according to historians. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: the general ideas that you could find something that was

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Speaker 1: green in the wintertime, some kind of evergreen branch, you know,

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Speaker 1: if it was pine needles or or holly or something,

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Speaker 1: and you'd bring that into the home around the winter

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Speaker 1: solstice and the green decoration would help distract the family

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Speaker 1: from the barren misery that is winter time. But Christmas

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Speaker 1: tree traditions themselves, where you'd actually cut down an evergreen

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Speaker 1: tree and then bring it inside the house, or at

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Speaker 1: least put it somewhere near the house or in the

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Speaker 1: barn or in the home. Uh. That appears to begin

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Speaker 1: among German speaking people's maybe around the sixteenth century. That again,

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Speaker 1: it's a little complicated because that seems to emerge from

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Speaker 1: similar older traditions. But but the Christmas tree itself looks

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Speaker 1: like it it comes around the fifteen hundreds. And this

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Speaker 1: was not the only Christmas decoration tradition among German speaking

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Speaker 1: people's at the time. Another German classic was what came

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Speaker 1: to be known as the Christmas pyramid, though this name

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Speaker 1: comes after Napoleon's adventures in Egypt. Uh. It's not strictly

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Speaker 1: a pyramid like the ones at Giza. You've seen this before.

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Speaker 1: It's sort of a tapering miniature tower with platforms populated

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Speaker 1: by angels with trumpets and other critters of that stripe.

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Speaker 1: It's a little diorama. Okay, I you know, I don't

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Speaker 1: know that I've seen this. I think I've seen pyramid

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Speaker 1: type constructions where they use point seta plants and kind

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Speaker 1: of arrange them like that. But I think one thing

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Speaker 1: you could do when you're building your Christmas pyramid is

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Speaker 1: put some evergreen branches on it, you know, kind of

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Speaker 1: spruce it up and like, oh it's maybe it's not winter.

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Speaker 1: Here's something green. Yeah. And then of course slay all

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Speaker 1: the servants who helped you erect it and placed them

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Speaker 1: under the under the pyramid, right scoop the brains out

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Speaker 1: of the angels through the nose. Yeah. Yeah, oh man,

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Speaker 1: you know, an ancient Egyptian themed Christmas tree would actually

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Speaker 1: be quite lovely. I'm not sure if you would put

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Speaker 1: at the top maybe a cyrus. Maybe you could put

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Speaker 1: in the sun disc. I don't know. There's there's so

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Speaker 1: much you could do. Now I want to make one,

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Speaker 1: except that I would not be permitted to do that. Now.

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Speaker 1: I was looking more into the uh, the history here

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Speaker 1: the tree, and you you pointed to the sixteenth century

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Speaker 1: origins in Germany, and certainly that seems to be when

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Speaker 1: it was. We can really point to it and say like,

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Speaker 1: here is the Christmas tree tradition in action. But I

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Speaker 1: was also reading from a book by Judith Flanders, Christmas

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Speaker 1: Say Biography. She's a historian and writer with a specialty.

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Speaker 1: Her main especially, I think is Victorian history, and she

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Speaker 1: says that we can we can think of of many

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Speaker 1: of these earlier traditions as again precursors to the Christmas Tree,

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Speaker 1: and an association that had been forged between winter traditions

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Speaker 1: and the tree we're already growing around this time, especially

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Speaker 1: in Germany. The origins, she says, seemed to take us

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Speaker 1: back to the early fifteenth century. In Germany, there are

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Speaker 1: records of a fourteen nineteen decorated tree in Friedburg decorated

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Speaker 1: with apples, flower paste wafers, tinsel and gingerbread flower paste wafers.

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Speaker 1: Oh boy, so Flanders points to documented traditions of paradise

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Speaker 1: plays performed at the time and performed around Christmas. They

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Speaker 1: use They would have used an evergreen fur with apples

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Speaker 1: tied to their branches in place of the Tree of

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Speaker 1: Knowledge a k a. The Tree of the Knowledge of

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Speaker 1: good and Evil, which of course is important to Judeo

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Speaker 1: Christian traditions and tied to the world tree myths in general. Right,

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Speaker 1: So in the paradise play, this would be reproducing the

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Speaker 1: the the myth of the Garden of Eden, where Eve

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Speaker 1: is tempted by the serpent to eat of the tree

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Speaker 1: of the knowledge of good and evil, which Adam and

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Speaker 1: Eve have been forbidden from from partaking of. They can

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Speaker 1: eat of the tree of life, and that you know,

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Speaker 1: live forever, but they can't know what's right and wrong.

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Speaker 1: And and once they eat of the fruit, then they

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Speaker 1: realize they're naked, and all kinds of bad stuff happens.

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Speaker 1: God gets very angry. Yeah, it's a it's a whole scene,

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Speaker 1: trust me. But at any rate that this would have

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Speaker 1: been a tree standing in to represent that mythic tree,

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Speaker 1: and the decorations would have included wool thread against straw apples,

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Speaker 1: things like nuts and pretzels and pretzels. Yeah, pretzels, which

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Speaker 1: makes sense, right, You can make things out of pretzels,

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Speaker 1: make curious shapes and all. It sounds good and also

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Speaker 1: feels authentically German. This brings up a question I was

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Speaker 1: talking about with Rachel recently, and something about this has

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Speaker 1: me still a little bit steaming. Are you not supposed

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Speaker 1: to eat a gingerbread house. I'm getting mixed signals about

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Speaker 1: what the whole deal with the gingerbread house is, because

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Speaker 1: if you're not supposed to eat it, why are you

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Speaker 1: making it entirely out of edible foods. Uh. I guess

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Speaker 1: that's a redundancy out of edible things. And if you

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Speaker 1: are supposed to eat it, why is it treated I

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Speaker 1: don't know, I'm very confused. Well, I guess part of

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Speaker 1: it is that it's not just you know, cookieer cake,

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Speaker 1: it's load bearing cookier cake. Right. Um. Yeah. I was

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Speaker 1: always told you were making a gingerbread house, but you

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Speaker 1: can't eat it because the gingerbread is obviously just sitting

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Speaker 1: out on the table and is not fit for consumption

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Speaker 1: at this point. You know, when you turn the lights

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Speaker 1: off at night, you go to bed, and you nestle in,

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Speaker 1: and you nestle in and get all cozy, the roaches

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Speaker 1: come out. They crawl all over the gingerbread house, so

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Speaker 1: they eat little bits off of it, and then they

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Speaker 1: scurry away in the morning. So if you go and

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Speaker 1: take a bite, you just know who you're eating after exactly. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's that's all a good reason not to trust it,

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Speaker 1: unless I guess you're very controlling with your gingerbread house.

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Speaker 1: It goes into the refrigerator when you're not using it.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I could see that as working and that

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Speaker 1: could be fun, but otherwise you don't eat the house.

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Speaker 1: You eat them men. You eat the gingerbread men. Voiced

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Speaker 1: by Gary Busey. Yeah, alright, So this tree is becomes popular.

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Speaker 1: In fact, it becomes so popular it out last the

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Speaker 1: popularity of these paradise plays, and it becomes this holiday tradition.

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Speaker 1: It is the it is the Christmas tree. It is

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Speaker 1: the the vi Knox bomb. So Flanders rights of the

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Speaker 1: oldest Christmas tree market was apparently in Strassburg, just over

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Speaker 1: the current German border in France in the seventeenth century,

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Speaker 1: and Flanders points to the first decorated indoor Christmas tree

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Speaker 1: as being is being tied to sixteen o five. Again,

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Speaker 1: the decorations seemed to include things like apples and sweets,

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Speaker 1: and they became quite popular in the Strasburg region with

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Speaker 1: Actually there were fifteenth century laws put in place at

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Speaker 1: one point to limit the number of trees per household. Oh,

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Speaker 1: this is not the last place we're going to encounter

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Speaker 1: laws regulating Christmas trees. Yeah, I mean people, you know,

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Speaker 1: they get upset about the War on Christmas, But wars

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Speaker 1: must be waged against Christmas to keep it from getting

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Speaker 1: out of control, because it will. This is a centuries

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Speaker 1: long tradition. Yeah. Now, speaking of the traditions though, uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, we we often expect here in the United States. Uh,

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Speaker 1: and and certainly in England. You think of it as being,

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Speaker 1: you know, firmly rooted in English speaking people's right. But

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Speaker 1: the tradition didn't actually travel from Germany to England till

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Speaker 1: the final quarter of the eighteenth century. Flanders points to

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Speaker 1: the Gurton novel The Sorrows of Young Werther from seventeen

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Speaker 1: seventy four, which was translated into English and includes a

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Speaker 1: description of a tree not only with organic decorations, but

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Speaker 1: with lights. So I had to I had to look

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Speaker 1: it up, and you can find this text in full

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Speaker 1: on the internet. And but it here's the juicy part. Quote.

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Speaker 1: He began talking of the delight of the children and

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Speaker 1: of that age when the sudden appearance of the Christmas

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Speaker 1: tree decorated with fruits and sweetmeats and lighted up with

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Speaker 1: wax candles causes such transports of joy. The tree lighted

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Speaker 1: up with wax candles is going to cause such transports

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Speaker 1: of something. Yes, So another big thing that was involved

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Speaker 1: in the transfer of the Christmas tree tradition to England

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Speaker 1: in seventeen eighty nine, the German wife of George the

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Speaker 1: third suggested they erect quote an illuminated tree according to

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Speaker 1: the German fashion, and and so you see it making

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Speaker 1: the leap over into England. Now, as for the Christmas

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Speaker 1: tree in North America, this is interesting. Flanders rights that

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Speaker 1: it may have been here in North America as soon

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Speaker 1: as seventeen eighty six. Quote in North Carolina that year,

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Speaker 1: a member of the Morovian Brethren accused an apprentice of

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Speaker 1: cutting down a small pine tree on Christmas Eve, the

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Speaker 1: day on which trees were customarily erected in Germany. Interesting,

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Speaker 1: and there's also evidence of one in Georgia in eighteen

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Speaker 1: o five. So this is this is interesting. We often

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Speaker 1: think of of of things sort of you know, establishing

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Speaker 1: themselves in England and then becoming a thing here in

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Speaker 1: the United States. Uh, you know. But of course there

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Speaker 1: were people from from various European countries coming into North America.

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Speaker 1: So it ultimately makes perfect sense that the Christmas tree

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Speaker 1: would arrive here around the same time or even a

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Speaker 1: little earlier. Well. Yeah, so, based on what I've reading,

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Speaker 1: it seems like Christmas trees really started making their way

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Speaker 1: to the United States being brought with German immigrants, not

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Speaker 1: not so much coming directly from England, though a few

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Speaker 1: people in England were trying to to pick it up. Um,

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Speaker 1: it looks like the German immigrants would bring them in

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Speaker 1: the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but they weren't taken up

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Speaker 1: as readily among the general population as you might imagine.

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Speaker 1: And there was basically a history of religious discrimination against

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Speaker 1: Christmas trees and other types of Christmas celebrations. After all,

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Speaker 1: many of the early settlers of eastern the eastern North

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Speaker 1: American colonies were English Puritans, who most of the time

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Speaker 1: were not fans of the sort of you know, be

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Speaker 1: steel pagan implications of a hallowed tree. You know, they

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Speaker 1: were thinking, like, if you're going to put a tree

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Speaker 1: up in your house, why not just celebrate Christmas by

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Speaker 1: having a decapitation contest night. Uh so, And a few

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Speaker 1: examples of this William Bradford, you know, the king of

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Speaker 1: the Puritans, the pilgrim governor of the Plymouth Colony. He

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Speaker 1: was famous slash infamous, depending on your point of view. Apparently,

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Speaker 1: in one instance Bradford just went ballistic and chewed out

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Speaker 1: a bunch of people in the Plymouth Colony for trying

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Speaker 1: to take the day off on Christmas. So you know,

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Speaker 1: Bob cratchit's out in the street hanging out on Christmas morning,

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Speaker 1: and Bradford sees him and just his eyes glow red. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And so he's writing incredulously that instead of working, he

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Speaker 1: found people on Christmas Day quote in the street at

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Speaker 1: play openly, some pitching the bar and some at stool

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Speaker 1: ball and such like sports. And he regarded these celebrations

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Speaker 1: of Christmas as some kind of quote, pagan mockery of

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Speaker 1: God and the spirit of Jesus. So I think Bradford's

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Speaker 1: idea of Christmas is you go to work and then

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Speaker 1: maybe you go to church, but you do not decorate,

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Speaker 1: you do not play, you do not take the day off,

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Speaker 1: you do not sing. That that is all satanic mischief. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: he really sounds like the Grand here. Yeah, totally. And

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Speaker 1: there were some other examples that I found cited in

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Speaker 1: a in a history dot com article I was reading

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Speaker 1: called the history of Christmas Trees. So one of them

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Speaker 1: was about Oliver Cromwell, not in the colonies, but back

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Speaker 1: in England, English Puritan leader, one of the victors of

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Speaker 1: the English Civil War and becoming Lord Protector. He he

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Speaker 1: did not like what he called the heathen traditions of

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Speaker 1: things like Christmas carols, or decoration of trees or you know,

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Speaker 1: running around acting Mary, that that was all kind of

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Speaker 1: desecration of what he called the sacred event of Christmas.

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Speaker 1: Um And this article also says quote in sixteen fifty nine,

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Speaker 1: the General Court of Massachusetts enacted a law making any

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Speaker 1: observance of December twenty five other than a church service

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Speaker 1: a penal offense. People were fined for hanging decorations. The

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Speaker 1: stern solemnity continued until the nineteenth century, when the influx

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Speaker 1: of German and Irish immigrants undermine the Puritan legacy. Oh man,

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Speaker 1: this this is rich again, especially when you look at

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Speaker 1: some of the like legitimate angst that emerges around you know,

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Speaker 1: so called wars on Christmas and so forth today. Well

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Speaker 1: it's this is funny because while I was reading about this,

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Speaker 1: looking at for these historical sources, I also just happened

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Speaker 1: to stumble across like fundamentalist Christian blogs called things like

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Speaker 1: Christmas Tree truths and stuff like that. They're still railing

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Speaker 1: against Christmas trees as a as a trapdoor into some

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Speaker 1: kind of covert Satanic mass it was. Yeah, that that's

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Speaker 1: a whole corner of the internet that is worth exploring. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: Christmas trees are just a gateway to find joy and

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Speaker 1: other Satanic concepts. Yeah, but so by the mid to

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Speaker 1: late eighteen hundreds there there had been a real transition.

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Speaker 1: By the late eighteen hundreds, Christmas trees started becoming popular

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Speaker 1: in homes throughout the United States, not just among German

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Speaker 1: immigrants and their descendants. Christmas became a federally recognized national

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Speaker 1: holiday in eighteen seventy I think that was signed into

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Speaker 1: law by Grant. And so, of course, as Christmas and

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Speaker 1: Christmas trees became more mainstream, and you know, you're not

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Speaker 1: necessarily part of an immigrant community who has a centuries

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Speaker 1: long tradition of how exactly to festoon the branches, you know,

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Speaker 1: going back to your grandparents and all that, the question

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Speaker 1: is going to become, how do you decorate this thing? Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, we're talking about Christmas tree lights, so the

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Speaker 1: immediate predecessor to electric Christmas tree lights, it's of course

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Speaker 1: going to be candles accentuated. This is interesting. I hadn't

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Speaker 1: really thought about this, but accentuated by special glass beads

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Speaker 1: that were strung around the tree. H Flanders mentioned this,

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Speaker 1: pointing out that check glassblowers specialized in these. Not only

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Speaker 1: were they beautiful, but they were they were something, they

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Speaker 1: were actually something on the tree that would not burn

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Speaker 1: if things got out of control. Uh. Because of course

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Speaker 1: fire is a big risk when you're talking about decorating

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Speaker 1: a tree with little candles, and it's it's actually, you know,

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Speaker 1: I knew this innately, like that's dangerous. That sounds like

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Speaker 1: an out of control fire waiting to happen, But I

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Speaker 1: hadn't really thought about all the various ways in which

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Speaker 1: it is dangerous. Uh. Flanders points out that that, first

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Speaker 1: of all, with candle lights and hearth fires in general,

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Speaker 1: fire was just a much greater daily risk back then.

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Speaker 1: But then you had these little candles wired or tied

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Speaker 1: the individual tree branches, which again in and of itself dangerous.

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Speaker 1: But then as the candles melt their weight altars and

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Speaker 1: uh and so so that's going to alter the tilt

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Speaker 1: of the branch that they're fixed to. UM, and that's

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Speaker 1: you know, potentially move moving that little ball of fire

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Speaker 1: around and putting it in contact with other branches and

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Speaker 1: decorations and things. On top of that, wax is dripping

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Speaker 1: down from these candles onto lower branches, and and and

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Speaker 1: uh in in increasing their weight as well. So the risks,

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Speaker 1: you know, go way beyond merely you know, a situation

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Speaker 1: of candles balanced in a dried out tree, it becomes

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Speaker 1: a moving system to contend with with with branches, with

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Speaker 1: one candle slowly moving up branches beneath, slowly dipping down

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Speaker 1: with accumulating wax um. It's frightening. Yeah, so, Flanders writes, quote.

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Speaker 1: A series of innovations and contrivances designed to hold each

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Speaker 1: candle in place with greater stability appeared over the years,

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Speaker 1: but a lit tree was never a safe tree. Many

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Speaker 1: households lit their candles only once on Christmas Eve, prudently

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Speaker 1: keeping the hand water and a stick with a sponge

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Speaker 1: on the end of it. Um, which sounds great, like

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Speaker 1: that that should be like a Christmas character, that should

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Speaker 1: be like have its own decoration, like the the sponge

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Speaker 1: stick guy for putting out the tree fire. Calls to

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Speaker 1: mind weird associations with the crucifixion scene and the sponge.

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Speaker 1: Yeah alright, so obviously again this is terribly dangerous situation,

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Speaker 1: but it is the immediate predecessor to the electric Christmas

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Speaker 1: tree lights, so this we can basically look back to

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Speaker 1: the late eighteen hundreds on this one. In eighteen eighty two,

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Speaker 1: the Edison Illuminating Company built the world's first electrical power station,

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Speaker 1: and four months later they lit up a Christmas tree.

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Speaker 1: It consisted of eighty red, white, and blue bulbs and

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Speaker 1: was installed in the home of Edward H. Johnson, an

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Speaker 1: inventor and Edison's business partner. But at this point electricity

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Speaker 1: was simply not established enough for regular folks to get

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Speaker 1: in on the action. This was a special tree, so

403
00:22:43,440 --> 00:22:46,639
Speaker 1: it was only for special events and places such as

404
00:22:46,920 --> 00:22:51,080
Speaker 1: an electric tree erected in the children's ward of the

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Speaker 1: New York City Hospital or in the White House put

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Speaker 1: up an electric tree. This would have been Grover Cleveland's

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Speaker 1: White House. Hundreds of multicolored electric bulbs. According to the

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Speaker 1: Library of Congress. Some historians credit this tree was spurring

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Speaker 1: the acceptance of indoor Christmas tree lights. Okay, but still

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00:23:09,840 --> 00:23:13,360
Speaker 1: you had to be either rich or an electricity nut,

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Speaker 1: or I guess ideally both to have this sort of

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Speaker 1: lighting set up at that time. According to the Library

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Speaker 1: of Congress, a light to light. An average Christmas tree

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Speaker 1: with electric lights before nineteen o three would have cost

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Speaker 1: something like two thousand dollars in today's dollars. But but

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Speaker 1: then at the turn of the century, General Electric buys

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Speaker 1: out Edison, and in nineteen o three they begin offering

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Speaker 1: pre assembled kits of Christmas lights. Okay, sorry, I'm trying

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Speaker 1: to imagine. So one of the things that predated electric

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Speaker 1: lighting indoors and homes was you would have gas supplied lamps, right,

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Speaker 1: so you'd actually kind of like the wiring in today's home.

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Speaker 1: You'd run gas pipes up through the walls and they'd

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Speaker 1: have a little output where you could attach a lamp,

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Speaker 1: and that they would be powered indoors, Could you have

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Speaker 1: a gas powered Christmas tree? Set? The gas pipe runs

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Speaker 1: up the trunk and then it goes out through some

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00:24:08,040 --> 00:24:10,560
Speaker 1: of the branches. They're just pipes around through them, and

428
00:24:10,600 --> 00:24:13,639
Speaker 1: then they're just lamps all up and down. I like

429
00:24:13,800 --> 00:24:17,320
Speaker 1: this idea of an unholy gas punk Christmas tree. Um

430
00:24:17,359 --> 00:24:19,240
Speaker 1: I did not. She does not mention it as being

431
00:24:19,240 --> 00:24:22,119
Speaker 1: a reality. But man, there's gotta be some wacky and

432
00:24:22,400 --> 00:24:26,199
Speaker 1: inventor who who tried it and exploded. If not, I

433
00:24:26,280 --> 00:24:29,520
Speaker 1: really just doubt the ambition of inventors in the eighties.

434
00:24:31,840 --> 00:24:34,639
Speaker 1: Um So anyway, they put out this kit, and a

435
00:24:34,720 --> 00:24:37,320
Speaker 1: Fleming quotes the brochure that comes with it. It says,

436
00:24:37,680 --> 00:24:41,400
Speaker 1: quote miniature incandescent lamps are perfectly adapted to Christmas tree lighting.

437
00:24:41,480 --> 00:24:43,560
Speaker 1: The element of danger I have a present with candles.

438
00:24:43,560 --> 00:24:46,359
Speaker 1: It's entirely removed, as well as the inconvenience of grease,

439
00:24:46,440 --> 00:24:49,080
Speaker 1: smoke and dirt. The lamps are all lighted at once

440
00:24:49,119 --> 00:24:51,359
Speaker 1: by turning off a switch, will burn as long as

441
00:24:51,359 --> 00:24:55,040
Speaker 1: desired without attention, and can be readily extinguished. No stick

442
00:24:55,080 --> 00:25:00,320
Speaker 1: with a sponge required. That sounds far preferable. Flanders Deep tales.

443
00:25:00,359 --> 00:25:03,240
Speaker 1: This is a string of twenty eight one candle power

444
00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:07,200
Speaker 1: miniature Edison lamps. It costs twelve dollars, and I believe

445
00:25:07,400 --> 00:25:09,919
Speaker 1: that breaks down to something like three fifty dollars in

446
00:25:09,920 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 1: today's money, which, to be clear, is is the sort

447
00:25:12,840 --> 00:25:15,320
Speaker 1: of some people are still paying and well beyond that

448
00:25:15,400 --> 00:25:18,560
Speaker 1: for their various holiday decorations. When you were growing up,

449
00:25:18,680 --> 00:25:21,200
Speaker 1: was there anybody in the town where you lived who

450
00:25:21,280 --> 00:25:23,920
Speaker 1: was like the house that everybody in town knew about

451
00:25:23,960 --> 00:25:26,479
Speaker 1: that would just go bonkers at Christmas and put up

452
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:29,760
Speaker 1: what looks like a million dollars worth of Christmas decorations

453
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:32,880
Speaker 1: in the yard and everybody drive by at night. Yeah. Yeah,

454
00:25:32,920 --> 00:25:36,320
Speaker 1: there were several of those grizzwoll households around you would

455
00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:38,400
Speaker 1: have you would drive out to see them. They were destinations.

456
00:25:38,760 --> 00:25:41,080
Speaker 1: Of course, Now we have so many inflatable decorations, which

457
00:25:41,080 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 1: are cool, but I feel like that takes takes away

458
00:25:45,720 --> 00:25:48,080
Speaker 1: some It doesn't take anything away from the decorations obviously,

459
00:25:48,119 --> 00:25:51,000
Speaker 1: but uh, there are all these other exciting ways to

460
00:25:51,040 --> 00:25:53,760
Speaker 1: decorate a house for the holidays. Now they don't necessarily

461
00:25:53,840 --> 00:25:57,040
Speaker 1: involve lights, but at the time, even in nineteen o three,

462
00:25:57,280 --> 00:26:00,440
Speaker 1: it sounds like you had some pretty cool options. Flaming points,

463
00:26:00,600 --> 00:26:04,280
Speaker 1: uh to some Austrian produced strings of lights quote with

464
00:26:04,359 --> 00:26:08,439
Speaker 1: bulbs shaped like fruit flowers and animals or snowmen or

465
00:26:08,520 --> 00:26:12,280
Speaker 1: Santa's And the cool thing about these these were apparently

466
00:26:12,359 --> 00:26:14,840
Speaker 1: battery powered and could be used in houses that didn't

467
00:26:14,840 --> 00:26:18,640
Speaker 1: have electricity, which is which is again an interesting innovation

468
00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:22,280
Speaker 1: because again three Yeah, and by the start of War

469
00:26:22,359 --> 00:26:26,720
Speaker 1: War one around nineteen fourteen, prices dropped to the affordable

470
00:26:26,800 --> 00:26:29,720
Speaker 1: range of a dollar seventy five, so it just became

471
00:26:30,200 --> 00:26:32,600
Speaker 1: you can just see the situation. More and more houses

472
00:26:32,640 --> 00:26:36,119
Speaker 1: are getting electricity, More and more households are cool with

473
00:26:36,160 --> 00:26:39,560
Speaker 1: the idea of having electricity in in the home on

474
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:42,159
Speaker 1: the Christmas tree. I also understand that there was an

475
00:26:42,160 --> 00:26:45,640
Speaker 1: insurance boost to having electric lights in your tree as

476
00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:48,480
Speaker 1: opposed to candles, And then it just becomes more and

477
00:26:48,520 --> 00:26:50,919
Speaker 1: more affordable, so more and more people buy into this.

478
00:26:52,080 --> 00:26:57,119
Speaker 1: According to the Library of Congress, American Albert Sedaka also

479
00:26:57,160 --> 00:27:00,639
Speaker 1: helped popularize tree lights. His family owned a novelty lighting store,

480
00:27:01,040 --> 00:27:03,240
Speaker 1: so he was well positioned to cash in on this

481
00:27:03,560 --> 00:27:07,240
Speaker 1: as a teenager in nineteen seventeen, he reportedly realized the demand,

482
00:27:07,560 --> 00:27:11,600
Speaker 1: and in nineteen twenty UH Albert and his brothers organized

483
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:16,560
Speaker 1: the National Outfit Manufacturers Association or NOMA, which became the

484
00:27:16,680 --> 00:27:20,040
Speaker 1: Noma Electric Company, and they ended up cornering the Christmas

485
00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:24,840
Speaker 1: light market until the nineteen sixties, and NOMA was responsible

486
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,359
Speaker 1: for a number of key innovations during their reign of

487
00:27:28,040 --> 00:27:32,520
Speaker 1: Christmas terror, UH, including bubble lights. Do you remember bubble lights, Joe?

488
00:27:32,680 --> 00:27:34,760
Speaker 1: I don't know what that is now, you know? Oh? Okay?

489
00:27:35,400 --> 00:27:38,359
Speaker 1: I believe I had an aunt or two even that

490
00:27:38,440 --> 00:27:41,000
Speaker 1: still had these on their trees. When I was a kid. Uh.

491
00:27:41,040 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 1: These were in nineteen six innovation. These were Uh. These

492
00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:50,080
Speaker 1: consisted of liquid feel filled vials of toxic methylene chloride.

493
00:27:51,560 --> 00:27:54,640
Speaker 1: And methylene chloride has a very low boiling point, so

494
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:57,080
Speaker 1: the heat of an electric bulb is enough to make

495
00:27:57,119 --> 00:28:01,520
Speaker 1: it bubble, which looks cool on a Christmas tree. But again,

496
00:28:01,760 --> 00:28:05,520
Speaker 1: toxic vials of bubbling liquid. Methylene chloride is also known

497
00:28:05,560 --> 00:28:08,760
Speaker 1: as di chloro methane and it I think it is

498
00:28:08,880 --> 00:28:12,680
Speaker 1: used as a paint thinner or like a paint stripper. Yeah.

499
00:28:13,080 --> 00:28:16,920
Speaker 1: So um, I'm I'm not jealous that I don't have

500
00:28:17,000 --> 00:28:19,239
Speaker 1: these in my house. Um, and I'm not sure there

501
00:28:19,320 --> 00:28:21,800
Speaker 1: might be some more acceptable form of bubble lights out

502
00:28:21,800 --> 00:28:24,240
Speaker 1: there today. But I would love to hear from anyone

503
00:28:24,240 --> 00:28:27,879
Speaker 1: out there who has memories of bubble lights uh or

504
00:28:27,960 --> 00:28:30,360
Speaker 1: has some sort of updated version of the technology now,

505
00:28:30,640 --> 00:28:33,800
Speaker 1: or just anybody who has has memories of older models

506
00:28:33,800 --> 00:28:37,080
Speaker 1: of Christmas tree lighting, because of course nowadays it's all

507
00:28:37,080 --> 00:28:40,200
Speaker 1: pretty much l e ed. Uh. They system seems to

508
00:28:40,200 --> 00:28:43,640
Speaker 1: be pretty much refined, The technology seems to be pretty stable,

509
00:28:43,760 --> 00:28:46,560
Speaker 1: with just varying degrees of like smart technology involved in

510
00:28:46,560 --> 00:28:49,040
Speaker 1: how they function. Like I think you can nowadays, you

511
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:51,440
Speaker 1: can get an artificial tree with lighting still you know,

512
00:28:51,480 --> 00:28:54,239
Speaker 1: already installed on it, and you can just you can

513
00:28:54,280 --> 00:28:56,800
Speaker 1: decide like the frequency of the twinkle, you can decide

514
00:28:56,840 --> 00:28:59,280
Speaker 1: like what the the colors are going to be, just

515
00:28:59,560 --> 00:29:02,000
Speaker 1: you know, on the fly. Oh, sorry to whip us back.

516
00:29:02,040 --> 00:29:04,440
Speaker 1: I think I just remember another use of dichlora methane,

517
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:07,080
Speaker 1: which I think it's the liquid that's in the dippy bird.

518
00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:11,080
Speaker 1: Oh oh oh yeah, the the dippy bird, the water

519
00:29:11,160 --> 00:29:14,680
Speaker 1: drinking a bird automaton. Yeah, well there you go. That

520
00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,560
Speaker 1: makes sense. Well, anyway, I'm gonna order some dangerous vintage

521
00:29:17,600 --> 00:29:20,200
Speaker 1: bubble lights. I'm sure you can get the money. Oh,

522
00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 1: be careful, please be careful out there. Um. You know,

523
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:26,560
Speaker 1: I'd also love to hear from anybody who still decorates

524
00:29:26,640 --> 00:29:29,600
Speaker 1: at all with candles. Um. I imagine some people still

525
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:32,800
Speaker 1: do this, at least for that one lighting. But oh,

526
00:29:33,040 --> 00:29:35,240
Speaker 1: I just don't know. I don't think I'm brave enough

527
00:29:35,240 --> 00:29:36,640
Speaker 1: to try it, even if I did have a sponge

528
00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:45,000
Speaker 1: on a state. Okay, so put down your sponge on

529
00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:48,720
Speaker 1: the stick, because I want you to picture another element

530
00:29:48,800 --> 00:29:52,520
Speaker 1: of a classic Christmas tree picture, like the vintage nineteen

531
00:29:52,600 --> 00:29:55,520
Speaker 1: fifties American Christmas tree, the kind of like you'd see

532
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:58,040
Speaker 1: in a Christmas story and that kind of thing. But

533
00:29:58,200 --> 00:30:00,320
Speaker 1: what do you see when you picture that in your mind?

534
00:30:00,440 --> 00:30:05,200
Speaker 1: Maybe these multicolored electric lights, maybe big old ball shaped

535
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:08,240
Speaker 1: ornaments kind of making the branches all drooped down under

536
00:30:08,280 --> 00:30:12,520
Speaker 1: their weight. And then there's that other stuff, stuff that

537
00:30:12,560 --> 00:30:15,800
Speaker 1: makes it look like the tree is dripping shiny metallic

538
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:21,000
Speaker 1: gack like a cassette tape has barfed silver pasta all

539
00:30:21,000 --> 00:30:24,800
Speaker 1: over the festive branches. Yes, and and over the floor

540
00:30:24,880 --> 00:30:28,200
Speaker 1: and um and just over the house in general. Uh,

541
00:30:28,480 --> 00:30:31,240
Speaker 1: you're talking, of course, about about tinsel or I think

542
00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:33,000
Speaker 1: when I was growing up we called them icicles for

543
00:30:33,040 --> 00:30:36,720
Speaker 1: some reason. But tinsel, Yes. So I've got to start

544
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:38,800
Speaker 1: off by saying, I don't know how many people still

545
00:30:38,840 --> 00:30:42,360
Speaker 1: actually use this stuff, but I do know it still exists.

546
00:30:42,400 --> 00:30:43,880
Speaker 1: You can buy it. I looked it up, but I'm

547
00:30:43,920 --> 00:30:47,720
Speaker 1: mainly associated with Christmas trees. You would see an old

548
00:30:47,800 --> 00:30:52,600
Speaker 1: polaroids from boomer childhood's. Yeah, we we definitely used it.

549
00:30:52,640 --> 00:30:54,920
Speaker 1: I was talking about tinsel with my wife last night,

550
00:30:55,200 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 1: and in both of our households growing up, Yeah, we

551
00:30:57,240 --> 00:31:00,200
Speaker 1: just tinseled the hell out of those trees like they

552
00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:04,120
Speaker 1: looked like somebody and to just she lacked them with

553
00:31:04,120 --> 00:31:07,880
Speaker 1: with with shiny metal drippings. So what is tinsel and

554
00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:10,520
Speaker 1: where did it come from and where did it go? Well,

555
00:31:10,680 --> 00:31:13,640
Speaker 1: so remember that the tradition of the Christmas tree, it

556
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:16,440
Speaker 1: ties into even older traditions, but it goes back at

557
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:20,880
Speaker 1: least as far as the sixteenth century in Germany. Um. So,

558
00:31:20,880 --> 00:31:25,680
Speaker 1: so what came before tinsel in this context? Apparently literal icicles,

559
00:31:26,320 --> 00:31:29,360
Speaker 1: because one thing I've read is that a common understanding

560
00:31:29,360 --> 00:31:33,720
Speaker 1: of the purpose of tinsel is to resemble icicles hanging

561
00:31:33,760 --> 00:31:36,600
Speaker 1: from the branches of an evergreen tree and glimmering in

562
00:31:36,640 --> 00:31:39,680
Speaker 1: the sun. Now, if the tree is inside your house,

563
00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:42,440
Speaker 1: it will not do to have icicles hanging from it

564
00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:45,080
Speaker 1: unless you have a really really cold house or you

565
00:31:45,360 --> 00:31:47,800
Speaker 1: don't mind having a really wet floor after they melt.

566
00:31:48,240 --> 00:31:51,600
Speaker 1: So this is the next best thing, right, shiny glittering

567
00:31:51,800 --> 00:31:55,840
Speaker 1: filaments that reflect the firelight and make your tree twinkle

568
00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:59,040
Speaker 1: with Christmas cheer. Absolutely, And it's kind of an upgrading

569
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:02,120
Speaker 1: of those checks that we talked about earlier, Right right,

570
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:06,520
Speaker 1: those were glass beads, right, Uh, So these are originally

571
00:32:06,560 --> 00:32:09,960
Speaker 1: going to be very metal. I was reading um not

572
00:32:10,080 --> 00:32:13,239
Speaker 1: metal like metal music they made of metal. I was

573
00:32:13,520 --> 00:32:16,080
Speaker 1: reading a Mental Floss article about this by Michelle deb

574
00:32:16,200 --> 00:32:20,120
Speaker 1: Chack about the history of of tinselong Christmas trees, and

575
00:32:20,200 --> 00:32:22,480
Speaker 1: she puts out a few interesting facts, one of which

576
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:24,840
Speaker 1: is that today tinsel is very cheap. You know, I

577
00:32:24,880 --> 00:32:26,640
Speaker 1: looked it up. You can get it from Target for

578
00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:29,440
Speaker 1: three dollars for a packet or something. But it was

579
00:32:29,520 --> 00:32:33,719
Speaker 1: once absolutely a luxury item, much like Christmas lights themselves.

580
00:32:34,320 --> 00:32:38,160
Speaker 1: In seventeenth century Germany, there are records of trees being

581
00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:42,440
Speaker 1: decorated with pressed strips made from real silver. And remember,

582
00:32:42,520 --> 00:32:44,400
Speaker 1: you know, one of the classic appeals of silver and

583
00:32:44,480 --> 00:32:47,160
Speaker 1: gold is the way they could shine beautifully. They'd reflect

584
00:32:47,200 --> 00:32:49,080
Speaker 1: the light in a way that was pretty. And this

585
00:32:49,200 --> 00:32:52,760
Speaker 1: was before the invention of cheaper metal and plastic foils.

586
00:32:53,560 --> 00:32:55,760
Speaker 1: So I was looking for more on the history here

587
00:32:55,800 --> 00:32:59,040
Speaker 1: of about tinsel and I found an interesting book by

588
00:32:59,080 --> 00:33:02,719
Speaker 1: Bernd Brunner are called Inventing the Christmas Tree, published by

589
00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:08,240
Speaker 1: Yale University Press in and Brunner has some interesting things

590
00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:11,000
Speaker 1: to point out here. Brunner says that quote tinsel was

591
00:33:11,080 --> 00:33:15,920
Speaker 1: probably inspired by the so called Leonie Drata, which he

592
00:33:15,960 --> 00:33:19,280
Speaker 1: says was introduced by Huguenots from leon. I think Leonishia

593
00:33:19,360 --> 00:33:23,360
Speaker 1: drata means Leonese wire, and this would be quote silver

594
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:27,360
Speaker 1: or gold plated copper wire that was originally a byproduct

595
00:33:27,400 --> 00:33:30,920
Speaker 1: of metal work. It is reminiscent of the silver thread

596
00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:34,440
Speaker 1: that was woven into church vestments in the Middle Ages

597
00:33:35,160 --> 00:33:39,320
Speaker 1: for a long time. Tinsel, also called silver plated sauerkraut

598
00:33:39,400 --> 00:33:43,800
Speaker 1: in colloquial German, was cut from tinfoil. It is reminiscent

599
00:33:43,840 --> 00:33:46,280
Speaker 1: of a thin icicle, but it could just as well

600
00:33:46,360 --> 00:33:50,760
Speaker 1: bring forth summary associations. And then he quotes a German

601
00:33:50,800 --> 00:33:53,920
Speaker 1: writer who's a like a German realist author named Theodore

602
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:57,800
Speaker 1: Storm in a passage from eighteen eighty four where he's

603
00:33:57,880 --> 00:34:01,200
Speaker 1: describing some stuff going on around Christmas. He says, quote,

604
00:34:01,520 --> 00:34:04,600
Speaker 1: on the Sunday before Christmas, my friend Peterson brought a

605
00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:08,520
Speaker 1: sack filled with a marvelous silver thread. The tree wrapped

606
00:34:08,520 --> 00:34:11,600
Speaker 1: in this fine silver thread looked like a flying summer.

607
00:34:12,320 --> 00:34:15,000
Speaker 1: But Bruner also notes that a variation on the silver

608
00:34:15,040 --> 00:34:19,760
Speaker 1: tincil was known as angels hair, fairies hair, or baby

609
00:34:19,880 --> 00:34:23,720
Speaker 1: Jesus's hair, and he says this was also a type

610
00:34:23,719 --> 00:34:27,399
Speaker 1: of fine metal thread. Ah, Now that's that's internet. First

611
00:34:27,400 --> 00:34:29,720
Speaker 1: of all, I mean, I just I'm picturing Jesus, adult

612
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:31,920
Speaker 1: Jesus with like a full head and beard of like

613
00:34:32,239 --> 00:34:36,680
Speaker 1: straight up silver metal hair. But it also reminds me um.

614
00:34:37,760 --> 00:34:40,360
Speaker 1: I remember talking to someone from the Czech Republic and

615
00:34:40,360 --> 00:34:42,840
Speaker 1: they were talking about the tradition of the baby Jesus

616
00:34:42,880 --> 00:34:45,960
Speaker 1: lowering gifts down. I think kind of like a golden

617
00:34:46,040 --> 00:34:48,880
Speaker 1: or metallic string. So I wonder if that's connected to

618
00:34:48,920 --> 00:34:51,920
Speaker 1: this tradition, like Jesus with a fishing pole, like the

619
00:34:51,920 --> 00:34:54,680
Speaker 1: Man on the moon kind of. I guess I'm down

620
00:34:54,840 --> 00:34:58,439
Speaker 1: Baby Jesus from on high using like the silver corn

621
00:34:58,560 --> 00:35:06,239
Speaker 1: really like a space elevator. That's very good. But so

622
00:35:06,360 --> 00:35:08,680
Speaker 1: to come back to this, the silver tinsil, So there

623
00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:11,719
Speaker 1: were a lot of problems with genuine silver tinsil. One

624
00:35:11,760 --> 00:35:14,440
Speaker 1: of the obvious ones I mentioned already is how expensive

625
00:35:14,480 --> 00:35:16,759
Speaker 1: it would have been. But also deb Check points out

626
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: another thing, which is that silver tarnishes very quickly, so

627
00:35:19,600 --> 00:35:21,239
Speaker 1: if you put it up on the Christmas tree, it

628
00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:26,480
Speaker 1: might tarnish before Christmas actually came around. Okay, so but

629
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:28,160
Speaker 1: then again, if you're if you're putting up your tree

630
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:32,600
Speaker 1: on the like the traditional German Christmas Eve erection night,

631
00:35:32,920 --> 00:35:35,799
Speaker 1: then it makes sense. I mean they don't call it

632
00:35:35,800 --> 00:35:38,040
Speaker 1: erection night obviously, but I mean that is the night

633
00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:41,439
Speaker 1: that you erect the Christmas tree. Okay, yeah, maybe I'm

634
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:44,520
Speaker 1: not sure when exactly the tincil would go up in

635
00:35:44,520 --> 00:35:47,720
Speaker 1: in what context, But but you know, there were problems

636
00:35:47,800 --> 00:35:51,400
Speaker 1: with it maintaining it's it's sheen for as long as

637
00:35:51,400 --> 00:35:55,080
Speaker 1: you would want it to, especially since it's expensive stuff. Yeah,

638
00:35:55,640 --> 00:35:57,960
Speaker 1: so I mean this might be problems with trying to

639
00:35:58,080 --> 00:36:00,279
Speaker 1: use it year after year. If it was need of

640
00:36:00,280 --> 00:36:02,480
Speaker 1: actual silver, you would probably want to do that, right,

641
00:36:03,680 --> 00:36:06,480
Speaker 1: But in the early nineteen hundreds of manufacturers in the

642
00:36:06,560 --> 00:36:09,319
Speaker 1: United States were making tinsel out of cheaper and more

643
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:13,600
Speaker 1: durable shiny metals like aluminum and copper. But there were

644
00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:17,600
Speaker 1: still some problems with the new models because aluminum paper

645
00:36:17,640 --> 00:36:21,360
Speaker 1: based tinsel was highly flammable. Again, this is going to

646
00:36:21,600 --> 00:36:23,960
Speaker 1: cause problems when you want to light up your tree, right.

647
00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:28,160
Speaker 1: But then also during World War One, copper was in

648
00:36:28,239 --> 00:36:30,799
Speaker 1: high demand for wartime production, and so that made it

649
00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:35,120
Speaker 1: a poor choice for you know, frivolities like holiday decorations.

650
00:36:35,160 --> 00:36:37,520
Speaker 1: So so what could come in to save the day.

651
00:36:37,560 --> 00:36:39,880
Speaker 1: What other medals could come in to be your cuddle

652
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:43,600
Speaker 1: friend for Christmas time? Oh oh, I don't know. Um,

653
00:36:44,840 --> 00:36:49,279
Speaker 1: I know you know where I'm going with this. Not lead, yep, lead?

654
00:36:50,239 --> 00:36:53,280
Speaker 1: Uh So, to read from teb Jack's article here, quote

655
00:36:53,960 --> 00:36:57,120
Speaker 1: lead revive tinsel from obscurity, and soon it was embraced

656
00:36:57,160 --> 00:36:59,920
Speaker 1: as a standard Christmas component, along with ornaments and all

657
00:37:00,000 --> 00:37:03,080
Speaker 1: ectric lights. It became so popular in the nineteen fifties

658
00:37:03,120 --> 00:37:05,319
Speaker 1: and sixties that tinsel has often thought of as a

659
00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:08,479
Speaker 1: mid century fad rather than a tradition that's been around

660
00:37:08,520 --> 00:37:12,279
Speaker 1: as long as Christmas trees themselves. With so many synthetic

661
00:37:12,320 --> 00:37:16,400
Speaker 1: decorations becoming available around Christmas time, tinsel made from metal

662
00:37:16,520 --> 00:37:19,120
Speaker 1: was considered one of the safer items to have in

663
00:37:19,120 --> 00:37:22,800
Speaker 1: the home. A nineteen fifty nine newspaper article on holiday

664
00:37:22,840 --> 00:37:26,480
Speaker 1: safety reads quote tinsel was fairly safe because even if

665
00:37:26,480 --> 00:37:32,720
Speaker 1: the kiddies decided to swallow it, it will not cause poisoning. Uh, folks,

666
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:35,680
Speaker 1: you you probably should not use tinsel based on lead

667
00:37:35,719 --> 00:37:38,360
Speaker 1: at all, and you definitely should not let the kiddies

668
00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:43,240
Speaker 1: decide to swallow it. Um. And this became quite clear

669
00:37:43,280 --> 00:37:45,480
Speaker 1: obviously by the end of the sixties. I mean, starting

670
00:37:45,480 --> 00:37:49,239
Speaker 1: in the mid sixties, you had great scientists like Claire C. Patterson,

671
00:37:49,760 --> 00:37:51,800
Speaker 1: you know, the Lord of Lead, who we've talked about before,

672
00:37:52,120 --> 00:37:55,200
Speaker 1: talking about the the dangers of lead in the environment

673
00:37:55,320 --> 00:37:58,440
Speaker 1: and dangers of lead being incorporated into the body. By

674
00:37:58,440 --> 00:38:01,960
Speaker 1: the early seventies, the message was really out and there was,

675
00:38:02,040 --> 00:38:06,000
Speaker 1: you know, widespread backlash against the total infiltration of lead

676
00:38:06,040 --> 00:38:09,520
Speaker 1: into every corner of our existence. I mean, this is

677
00:38:09,600 --> 00:38:11,640
Speaker 1: the era when you get like the banning of leaded

678
00:38:11,640 --> 00:38:14,600
Speaker 1: gasoline and things like that. Um. And of course, of

679
00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:17,960
Speaker 1: course this eventually also lead to the discontinuation of lead

680
00:38:18,000 --> 00:38:21,239
Speaker 1: in many consumer goods, including tenseil. So if you buy

681
00:38:21,320 --> 00:38:24,400
Speaker 1: tenseil today, it's probably gonna be made out of milar

682
00:38:24,719 --> 00:38:28,080
Speaker 1: or polyvinyl chloride with a shiny finish. Uh, you know,

683
00:38:28,120 --> 00:38:31,359
Speaker 1: you're gonna get probably some kind of plastic product. But

684
00:38:31,440 --> 00:38:33,560
Speaker 1: despite the fact that you can still buy it, I

685
00:38:33,640 --> 00:38:37,000
Speaker 1: have noticed I don't really see it very much anymore.

686
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:40,200
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously somebody still using it because you can

687
00:38:40,200 --> 00:38:42,760
Speaker 1: still get it. But like, my question is what happened

688
00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:47,719
Speaker 1: to tenseil. I wonder if modern versions of it just

689
00:38:47,800 --> 00:38:52,239
Speaker 1: have too many associations with like the post war plastic

690
00:38:52,320 --> 00:38:55,839
Speaker 1: boom kind of energy if it just seems too synthetic,

691
00:38:56,520 --> 00:39:00,440
Speaker 1: because Bruner writes of a countervailing force against soul in

692
00:39:00,480 --> 00:39:03,399
Speaker 1: all of its forms in In one paragraph in his book,

693
00:39:03,400 --> 00:39:06,400
Speaker 1: he says, quote at the end of the eighteen seventies,

694
00:39:06,600 --> 00:39:11,080
Speaker 1: there is documentation from Corinthian gael Valley in southern Austria,

695
00:39:11,440 --> 00:39:14,920
Speaker 1: that a thick spruce, free of all decoration, was placed

696
00:39:14,960 --> 00:39:17,200
Speaker 1: in the corner of a farmstead as a sign of

697
00:39:17,239 --> 00:39:21,359
Speaker 1: silent joy. On frosty, cold winter mornings. The tree, now

698
00:39:21,400 --> 00:39:24,960
Speaker 1: covered with little icicles and illuminated by the sun's rays,

699
00:39:25,400 --> 00:39:28,479
Speaker 1: shimmered like a Christmas tree covered in lights without any

700
00:39:28,560 --> 00:39:32,680
Speaker 1: tensil or Fairi's hair. The wild beauty of the tree sufficed.

701
00:39:33,600 --> 00:39:35,080
Speaker 1: And this kind of brings us back to what we

702
00:39:35,080 --> 00:39:37,680
Speaker 1: were talking about at the beginning, like the fake tree

703
00:39:37,800 --> 00:39:41,520
Speaker 1: versus the real tree. I mean, I feel that real

704
00:39:41,560 --> 00:39:44,839
Speaker 1: tree drive, even though habits have prevented me from ever

705
00:39:44,920 --> 00:39:47,840
Speaker 1: going there. And the real tree drive, I think feeds

706
00:39:47,880 --> 00:39:51,960
Speaker 1: into a maybe maybe a more total rejection of things

707
00:39:52,000 --> 00:39:55,880
Speaker 1: that remind you of synthetic industrial products when you're decorating

708
00:39:55,920 --> 00:40:00,800
Speaker 1: for Christmas. Yeah, I do admire those really organic trees

709
00:40:00,880 --> 00:40:04,239
Speaker 1: you see sometimes where they're they're using like strong popcorn

710
00:40:04,440 --> 00:40:06,759
Speaker 1: around it, and and yeah, maybe getting back to the

711
00:40:06,840 --> 00:40:11,000
Speaker 1: use of apples and so forth. Uh, you know it's yeah,

712
00:40:11,160 --> 00:40:13,120
Speaker 1: I do like that the idea that you could basically

713
00:40:13,160 --> 00:40:16,279
Speaker 1: just eat the whole tree after after Christmas, just eat

714
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:18,400
Speaker 1: it up or just I guess it's you know, completely

715
00:40:18,400 --> 00:40:22,040
Speaker 1: compostable to some degree as well, that let the fungus

716
00:40:22,120 --> 00:40:25,640
Speaker 1: have it. Uh. But there's one more passage I want

717
00:40:25,640 --> 00:40:27,719
Speaker 1: to read before we move on. This doesn't really have

718
00:40:27,800 --> 00:40:31,040
Speaker 1: much to do with tenseil, but I was reading parts

719
00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:33,680
Speaker 1: of this book Inventing the Christmas Tree by Burned Bruner,

720
00:40:33,920 --> 00:40:38,520
Speaker 1: and um, I came across one section where I met

721
00:40:38,560 --> 00:40:43,440
Speaker 1: the hannibal lecter of Christmas, just the most astonishingly anal

722
00:40:43,520 --> 00:40:46,719
Speaker 1: retentive Christmas fanatic in history. Do you mind if I

723
00:40:46,760 --> 00:40:48,960
Speaker 1: read this just because I thought it was let's let's

724
00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:51,400
Speaker 1: do it, let's lean into the holidays. Yeah, okay, okay,

725
00:40:51,440 --> 00:40:54,000
Speaker 1: So this is Brunner, this is Bruner himself writing this

726
00:40:54,080 --> 00:40:58,960
Speaker 1: introduction to the passage. Brunner says some specialists transformed decoration

727
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:02,879
Speaker 1: of the Christmas tree into an exceptional skill. Among them

728
00:41:02,960 --> 00:41:06,720
Speaker 1: was the German Hugo Elm who in his eighteen seventy

729
00:41:06,760 --> 00:41:10,520
Speaker 1: eight Golden Christmas Book made a plea for quote a

730
00:41:10,640 --> 00:41:14,600
Speaker 1: tasteful separation of the numerous decorations on the tree in

731
00:41:14,719 --> 00:41:19,719
Speaker 1: order to avoid a bland hodgepodge. He suggested the following

732
00:41:19,760 --> 00:41:22,920
Speaker 1: steps precisely designed for the anatomy of the tree and

733
00:41:23,000 --> 00:41:26,320
Speaker 1: the load capacity of its branches, and here the quote begins.

734
00:41:27,000 --> 00:41:30,520
Speaker 1: Decoration should begin with the heaviest objects, which are best

735
00:41:30,560 --> 00:41:33,240
Speaker 1: placed near the trunk and in the middle of a branch.

736
00:41:33,840 --> 00:41:38,200
Speaker 1: Next one should place the nuts. Place silver and gold nuts,

737
00:41:38,239 --> 00:41:41,600
Speaker 1: alternating about three to four pieces on the longer and

738
00:41:41,680 --> 00:41:44,399
Speaker 1: two to three on the shorter branches, and on the

739
00:41:44,440 --> 00:41:49,360
Speaker 1: top smallest branches only one each. The golden and silver

740
00:41:49,480 --> 00:41:53,279
Speaker 1: pine cones, in contrast, should be placed farther forward in

741
00:41:53,360 --> 00:41:56,520
Speaker 1: the second third of the branch, as calculated from the

742
00:41:56,560 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 1: trunk outward. Marzipan and sweets are best placed in between

743
00:42:01,360 --> 00:42:05,440
Speaker 1: two nuts. Shiny glass balls, fruits and the like are

744
00:42:05,480 --> 00:42:08,759
Speaker 1: to be placed preferably on the upper branches in order

745
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:12,000
Speaker 1: to enjoy the effect of their refracting rays of light.

746
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:15,520
Speaker 1: Metal coils and tinsel are spread out at the tips

747
00:42:15,560 --> 00:42:18,719
Speaker 1: of the secondary branches, for these are thinner and are

748
00:42:18,760 --> 00:42:22,560
Speaker 1: more likely to sway than the thicker main branches, and

749
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:25,680
Speaker 1: small baskets and nets made of paper are placed on

750
00:42:25,760 --> 00:42:30,520
Speaker 1: secondary branches. The individual stars should be distributed evenly, while

751
00:42:30,560 --> 00:42:35,400
Speaker 1: the strings of alternating nuts, straw, stars, paper and similar

752
00:42:35,640 --> 00:42:39,040
Speaker 1: are to be wound around the branches and distributed. Paper

753
00:42:39,040 --> 00:42:41,760
Speaker 1: bags should always be put on the tips of the branches,

754
00:42:42,080 --> 00:42:44,919
Speaker 1: ideally beneath the lights. At the top of the tree,

755
00:42:44,960 --> 00:42:48,640
Speaker 1: one customarily puts a large star made of cardboard covered

756
00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:51,800
Speaker 1: with golden paper, in which one glues either a self

757
00:42:51,920 --> 00:42:55,840
Speaker 1: made or bought Christmas angel, a thick tome with golden

758
00:42:55,960 --> 00:42:59,960
Speaker 1: fringe and an old Gothic script displaying the Sublime Christmas

759
00:43:00,120 --> 00:43:03,920
Speaker 1: saying glory to God in the high also looks magnificent.

760
00:43:04,440 --> 00:43:06,640
Speaker 1: Once the lights have been put on the tree, the

761
00:43:06,680 --> 00:43:09,440
Speaker 1: tops of the branches can be covered with loosely pulled

762
00:43:09,480 --> 00:43:14,040
Speaker 1: cotton and these then affixed with silver thread. This is

763
00:43:14,080 --> 00:43:18,480
Speaker 1: my design, Okay, So here's my idea. Actually, in the

764
00:43:18,520 --> 00:43:23,120
Speaker 1: tradition of Batman versus Superman, Freddie versus Jason, Godzilla versus

765
00:43:23,200 --> 00:43:27,160
Speaker 1: King Kong, we've got to have a big movie Christmas extravaganza.

766
00:43:27,520 --> 00:43:33,120
Speaker 1: Hugo elm versus William Bradford the man who Hated Christmas

767
00:43:33,280 --> 00:43:36,120
Speaker 1: versus the man who will kill you if you put

768
00:43:36,120 --> 00:43:42,520
Speaker 1: the nuts and the stars in the wrong order. Oh wow, wow, yeah,

769
00:43:42,560 --> 00:43:45,960
Speaker 1: I love that reading. It's just so um pedantic, so

770
00:43:48,680 --> 00:43:56,719
Speaker 1: so tyrannical concerning the decoration of the Christmas tree than

771
00:43:58,880 --> 00:44:00,959
Speaker 1: right there at the end though, he you mentioned the star,

772
00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:08,520
Speaker 1: the angel, the tree topper. Joe, what's what's your tree topper? Oh? Um,

773
00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:10,000
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know the answer. I could go

774
00:44:10,080 --> 00:44:14,120
Speaker 1: check right now, let me let me go check some

775
00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:23,360
Speaker 1: waiting music in the meantime, all right, and may have

776
00:44:23,400 --> 00:44:25,200
Speaker 1: caught him in alive. There may be no Christmas tree

777
00:44:25,239 --> 00:44:34,120
Speaker 1: and he's not coming back. Oh it's anticlimactic. It's a star. Yeah.

778
00:44:34,120 --> 00:44:36,680
Speaker 1: The star and the angel are are typical. You do

779
00:44:36,760 --> 00:44:40,840
Speaker 1: see some other quirky Christmas tree toppers. I I have

780
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 1: some family members to use a tartist at the top

781
00:44:43,080 --> 00:44:48,120
Speaker 1: of their tree. They can they consider that the pinnacle. Um.

782
00:44:48,120 --> 00:44:50,560
Speaker 1: But of course one of the big ones is either

783
00:44:50,640 --> 00:44:53,760
Speaker 1: the star or the angel. So for our final section

784
00:44:53,880 --> 00:44:57,239
Speaker 1: in this episode, I wanted to talk about the angelic

785
00:44:57,320 --> 00:45:00,280
Speaker 1: tree topper. So remember when we discussed the Victor Orion

786
00:45:00,360 --> 00:45:02,480
Speaker 1: Christmas tree. Apparently it was during this time that the

787
00:45:02,520 --> 00:45:05,759
Speaker 1: angel really became popular as a Christmas tree topper, and

788
00:45:05,840 --> 00:45:08,319
Speaker 1: it remains a popular choice to this day. Though for

789
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:11,479
Speaker 1: the most part, these are generally the most boring sort

790
00:45:11,520 --> 00:45:15,080
Speaker 1: of angelic depictions you could ask for, never the fearsome

791
00:45:15,280 --> 00:45:19,000
Speaker 1: or surreal angels that one often finds another treatments and

792
00:45:19,200 --> 00:45:23,080
Speaker 1: art and artistry and even in um sacred literature. Now,

793
00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:25,960
Speaker 1: these are generally like little dress up dolls with wings

794
00:45:25,960 --> 00:45:29,000
Speaker 1: in a halo. This is not the terrifying messenger who

795
00:45:29,040 --> 00:45:33,720
Speaker 1: carves the seven p's into Dante's forehead, right right, which

796
00:45:33,760 --> 00:45:36,120
Speaker 1: again I say, missed opportunity there. I'd love to hear

797
00:45:36,120 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: from anyone who has a more terrifying angel at the

798
00:45:38,480 --> 00:45:40,040
Speaker 1: top of their tree. I guess you could put. I

799
00:45:40,040 --> 00:45:42,560
Speaker 1: know they have ornaments of the what what are they?

800
00:45:42,560 --> 00:45:45,920
Speaker 1: The weeping angels from doctor who? So maybe some uh,

801
00:45:46,000 --> 00:45:47,960
Speaker 1: some doctor who fans out there have have those at

802
00:45:47,960 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: the top. Oh, that's not a bad idea, but uh,

803
00:45:51,440 --> 00:45:55,359
Speaker 1: to discuss what came before this this invention. Basically we're

804
00:45:55,400 --> 00:45:57,600
Speaker 1: using this is an excuse to talk about angels and

805
00:45:57,680 --> 00:46:00,200
Speaker 1: Christmas tree angels. Basically, the Angel of the top of

806
00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:03,760
Speaker 1: the Christmas Tree is there because the Angel Gabriel factors

807
00:46:03,800 --> 00:46:07,400
Speaker 1: into the Christmas story. Gabriel is the Angel of annunciation,

808
00:46:07,719 --> 00:46:10,920
Speaker 1: the messenger of the Almighty God that informs Mary that

809
00:46:11,040 --> 00:46:14,239
Speaker 1: she is pregnant with the Son of God. And just

810
00:46:14,280 --> 00:46:16,880
Speaker 1: to give you a taste of the the original Bible

811
00:46:17,000 --> 00:46:19,399
Speaker 1: literature here that is from the King James version UH

812
00:46:19,520 --> 00:46:24,400
Speaker 1: Luke one. And in the sixth Month, the Angel Gabriel

813
00:46:24,480 --> 00:46:28,200
Speaker 1: was sent from God into a city of Galilee named Nazareth,

814
00:46:28,600 --> 00:46:31,719
Speaker 1: to a virgin espouse to a man whose name was

815
00:46:31,800 --> 00:46:34,600
Speaker 1: Joseph of the House of David, and the virgin's name

816
00:46:35,000 --> 00:46:37,120
Speaker 1: was Mary. I believe it's also in the Gospel of

817
00:46:37,200 --> 00:46:40,360
Speaker 1: Luke that the Angel later at the birth of Jesus

818
00:46:40,440 --> 00:46:43,040
Speaker 1: appears to the shepherds and tells them the good news

819
00:46:43,080 --> 00:46:45,880
Speaker 1: that I'm unto them, My Savior is born right. And

820
00:46:45,920 --> 00:46:48,400
Speaker 1: I think that that if I'm not mistaken, that angel

821
00:46:48,560 --> 00:46:50,680
Speaker 1: is not named, but it's often assumed that it might

822
00:46:50,680 --> 00:46:53,200
Speaker 1: be the same angel, or I guess maybe angels working

823
00:46:53,200 --> 00:46:56,759
Speaker 1: for Gabriel. Uh. It's all a little vague, but but

824
00:46:56,840 --> 00:46:59,879
Speaker 1: Gabriel is often referred to as the Herald a ka

825
00:47:00,080 --> 00:47:02,040
Speaker 1: Harold Angel. You may have heard of him. He's been

826
00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:06,959
Speaker 1: heart the Herald Angel sings um. But Gabriel is also

827
00:47:07,040 --> 00:47:10,440
Speaker 1: sometimes referred to as the Angel of Death or though

828
00:47:10,480 --> 00:47:11,800
Speaker 1: the end of the one who will blow the final

829
00:47:11,800 --> 00:47:14,880
Speaker 1: trumpet before the end of time. He's also sometimes described

830
00:47:14,920 --> 00:47:19,480
Speaker 1: as a deathbad angel who eases people into the next life. Yeah,

831
00:47:19,520 --> 00:47:24,279
Speaker 1: the actual characteristics and individual identities of the angels and

832
00:47:24,320 --> 00:47:28,680
Speaker 1: their hierarchies are not really explored in what's usually considered

833
00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:31,800
Speaker 1: canonical biblical literature, but a lot of sort of apocryphal

834
00:47:31,880 --> 00:47:35,759
Speaker 1: and you know, extra canonical works. Now here's a fun fact.

835
00:47:35,760 --> 00:47:38,480
Speaker 1: According to Carol Rose, who often referred to for various

836
00:47:38,480 --> 00:47:42,879
Speaker 1: mythical and uh, you know, fanciful creatures, Rose points out

837
00:47:42,880 --> 00:47:46,600
Speaker 1: that the word angel derives from the Greek anglos and

838
00:47:46,640 --> 00:47:49,279
Speaker 1: would have been pronounced with a hard g up until

839
00:47:49,280 --> 00:47:51,839
Speaker 1: the end of the thirteenth century, in line with Old

840
00:47:51,840 --> 00:47:55,640
Speaker 1: English and Teutonic traditions, but then the French influence softens it.

841
00:47:56,560 --> 00:47:59,840
Speaker 1: That's interesting now, when you see the word angel appearing

842
00:48:00,120 --> 00:48:02,960
Speaker 1: like the Bible, that comes from word that originally just

843
00:48:03,040 --> 00:48:07,920
Speaker 1: means messenger, So like the angels are the messengers of

844
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:11,799
Speaker 1: the divine realm. Yeah. Yeah, sometimes that message takes the

845
00:48:11,840 --> 00:48:14,880
Speaker 1: form of announcing a birth. Sometimes it's more than the

846
00:48:14,920 --> 00:48:18,040
Speaker 1: destruction of an entire city, that sort of thing. But

847
00:48:18,560 --> 00:48:21,160
Speaker 1: I have to say, growing up in Christianity, I often

848
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:26,560
Speaker 1: gravitated towards the weirdness of angels because they were supernatural outsiders,

849
00:48:26,640 --> 00:48:29,399
Speaker 1: demi god like travelers, and there's of course a ton

850
00:48:29,440 --> 00:48:32,840
Speaker 1: of interesting material built up around them, from their depiction

851
00:48:32,960 --> 00:48:36,640
Speaker 1: throughout hard history, to their place in occult magic, to

852
00:48:36,719 --> 00:48:39,880
Speaker 1: their treatment in modern popular culture, and also in the

853
00:48:40,480 --> 00:48:44,560
Speaker 1: spiritual warfare fundamentalist theology that was popular back in the

854
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:47,279
Speaker 1: ninety nineties, and I guess it's probably still popular in

855
00:48:47,320 --> 00:48:51,080
Speaker 1: some circles. But you know, angels were just this deeply

856
00:48:51,160 --> 00:48:56,120
Speaker 1: weird concept that was just an accepted aspect of religious reality. Well, yeah,

857
00:48:56,280 --> 00:48:59,600
Speaker 1: there is a funny irony and like the insistence of

858
00:49:00,040 --> 00:49:03,560
Speaker 1: the idea of monotheism, and yet there are these heavenly

859
00:49:03,600 --> 00:49:06,800
Speaker 1: beings called angels, and you might say, well, but they're

860
00:49:06,880 --> 00:49:11,040
Speaker 1: heavenly beings but not gods. And then you just get

861
00:49:11,080 --> 00:49:13,360
Speaker 1: into sort of like hair splitting over what the meaning

862
00:49:13,360 --> 00:49:14,960
Speaker 1: of God is because a lot of the things that

863
00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:18,240
Speaker 1: are called gods and what are openly acknowledged as polytheistic

864
00:49:18,280 --> 00:49:21,920
Speaker 1: religions actually in many ways are similar to what people

865
00:49:21,960 --> 00:49:26,000
Speaker 1: believe about angels and say Christianity. Yeah, because if you're

866
00:49:26,120 --> 00:49:28,120
Speaker 1: if you were like like I was, sometimes, if you're

867
00:49:28,160 --> 00:49:29,759
Speaker 1: board in church and you pick up the Bible and

868
00:49:29,760 --> 00:49:32,440
Speaker 1: you're like, well, I'm gonna read some angel stories, Uh,

869
00:49:32,480 --> 00:49:35,040
Speaker 1: You're gonna be a little disappointed because there's there's actually

870
00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:38,560
Speaker 1: not much angelic action in the Bible, just a handful

871
00:49:38,600 --> 00:49:42,480
Speaker 1: of occurrences, and there's nothing to explain why they exist.

872
00:49:42,520 --> 00:49:45,960
Speaker 1: There's no origin story or anything for the angels. Though,

873
00:49:45,960 --> 00:49:48,160
Speaker 1: if you want to get into stuff outside the biblical

874
00:49:48,200 --> 00:49:50,759
Speaker 1: canon about where the angels come from and all that,

875
00:49:50,840 --> 00:49:54,959
Speaker 1: you get some into some wild and awesome territory. Yeah,

876
00:49:54,960 --> 00:49:56,800
Speaker 1: there's a lot of a lot of great fan fiction

877
00:49:56,880 --> 00:49:59,680
Speaker 1: that it immerged throughout history about this. We'll feel like

878
00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:03,120
Speaker 1: we gotta explaying these guys where they come from. Um. So,

879
00:50:03,120 --> 00:50:04,840
Speaker 1: so I was looking into this a little bit for

880
00:50:04,840 --> 00:50:08,040
Speaker 1: for this episode, and uh I read uh the Archangel

881
00:50:08,080 --> 00:50:13,839
Speaker 1: Gabriel in History and Tradition by Roxana Eleana Yavashi. Uh,

882
00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:16,880
Speaker 1: and you've actually points out that the reason that angels

883
00:50:16,880 --> 00:50:20,400
Speaker 1: are basically taken for granted, both in Judaic and Christian traditions,

884
00:50:20,760 --> 00:50:23,239
Speaker 1: is that you did not need to explain them. They

885
00:50:23,239 --> 00:50:27,920
Speaker 1: are already part of our supernatural understanding of everyday reality

886
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:31,000
Speaker 1: in the world. The author points out that Hebrew ideas

887
00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:36,760
Speaker 1: of angels were influenced by Babylonian angelology and also by Zoroastrianism.

888
00:50:37,640 --> 00:50:40,399
Speaker 1: So the idea, as they explain it, is that while

889
00:50:40,480 --> 00:50:44,880
Speaker 1: angelic beings, demi gods and you know, various intermediaries that

890
00:50:44,960 --> 00:50:48,440
Speaker 1: serve primarily as messengers are sometimes agents of another sort.

891
00:50:48,719 --> 00:50:52,319
Speaker 1: They certainly factor into various religious systems, including the polytheism

892
00:50:52,400 --> 00:50:55,520
Speaker 1: of ancient Egypt. You know, they're there. But but while

893
00:50:55,520 --> 00:51:00,359
Speaker 1: they are, they factor into polytheistic um pantheons. They are

894
00:51:00,400 --> 00:51:06,000
Speaker 1: a necessity, they write for monotheistic religions, as the monotheistic

895
00:51:06,040 --> 00:51:09,080
Speaker 1: God is ultimately faceless, or at least does not reveal

896
00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:12,120
Speaker 1: its face to humans. So for a god of God's

897
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,920
Speaker 1: to do humanlike things, it has to send a humanlike messenger.

898
00:51:16,680 --> 00:51:19,799
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's kind of interesting. Now. I would say

899
00:51:19,800 --> 00:51:23,239
Speaker 1: that the idea of the monotheistic God is a like faceless,

900
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:26,920
Speaker 1: you know, disembodied kind of spirit that has no form

901
00:51:26,960 --> 00:51:30,080
Speaker 1: of its own. Is a much later understanding of that.

902
00:51:30,120 --> 00:51:32,399
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the earlier visions of that God

903
00:51:32,440 --> 00:51:35,120
Speaker 1: would give would give him a body and give him

904
00:51:35,200 --> 00:51:39,960
Speaker 1: much more recognizably humanlike features. Right, Yeah, And as the

905
00:51:39,960 --> 00:51:42,920
Speaker 1: author points out again, you have various messengers and agents

906
00:51:42,920 --> 00:51:46,400
Speaker 1: popping up in various polytheistic religions, and of course I

907
00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:49,600
Speaker 1: instantly thought about the avatars and Hinduism, by which a

908
00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:52,960
Speaker 1: single divine entity may take various forms, you know, some

909
00:51:53,200 --> 00:51:56,520
Speaker 1: much more human than others. The author points out though,

910
00:51:56,560 --> 00:51:59,399
Speaker 1: that you know that this ultimately shows the continued role

911
00:51:59,480 --> 00:52:03,040
Speaker 1: of trans sentence in religion. There's this increasing distance in

912
00:52:03,120 --> 00:52:06,520
Speaker 1: religious tradition between the world of the gods in the

913
00:52:06,560 --> 00:52:09,920
Speaker 1: world of humans. So if you look back to Greek myths, uh,

914
00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:11,920
Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of interplay between the gods

915
00:52:11,920 --> 00:52:14,640
Speaker 1: and humans, a lot of drama, direct drama between gods

916
00:52:14,640 --> 00:52:17,399
Speaker 1: and humans. You look to the Egyptian model, and there's

917
00:52:17,440 --> 00:52:19,799
Speaker 1: also this sense that this is all happening in the

918
00:52:19,840 --> 00:52:23,160
Speaker 1: same world in our world. But then there's this growing

919
00:52:23,200 --> 00:52:25,800
Speaker 1: distance between the place where God is and the place

920
00:52:25,800 --> 00:52:31,480
Speaker 1: where humans reside, and it then necessitates these holy intermediaries

921
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:34,600
Speaker 1: where instead of God showing up and saying hey, I'm

922
00:52:34,600 --> 00:52:38,160
Speaker 1: a bit ticked at you over this, and angels like hey, um,

923
00:52:38,280 --> 00:52:40,680
Speaker 1: God sent me. Yeah, yeah, he's not really happy about

924
00:52:40,680 --> 00:52:43,640
Speaker 1: this whole apple thing. Or he said to call off

925
00:52:43,680 --> 00:52:46,000
Speaker 1: the whole sacrifice your kid thing. Yeah, yeah, I just

926
00:52:46,040 --> 00:52:50,600
Speaker 1: got the message to middle management. Yes. Now, just as

927
00:52:50,600 --> 00:52:53,640
Speaker 1: angels don't really have a huge presence in the Bible, uh,

928
00:52:53,680 --> 00:52:57,640
Speaker 1: they're also rarely named. Gabriel is the first angel mentioned

929
00:52:57,640 --> 00:52:59,759
Speaker 1: in the Book of Daniel, and he he doesn't have

930
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:02,239
Speaker 1: a lot appears. I mean mostly it's just Michael the

931
00:53:02,360 --> 00:53:06,440
Speaker 1: Archangel as the other named angel um and as the

932
00:53:06,440 --> 00:53:09,040
Speaker 1: author points out here, Gabriel winds up doing quite a

933
00:53:09,040 --> 00:53:12,239
Speaker 1: bit of the heavy lifting. He interprets Daniel's visions. In

934
00:53:12,280 --> 00:53:15,759
Speaker 1: the Old Testament, he appears to Zacharias and announces the

935
00:53:15,760 --> 00:53:18,520
Speaker 1: birth of John the Baptist. In the New Testament, of course,

936
00:53:18,680 --> 00:53:21,360
Speaker 1: appears to marry like we already mentioned, and then in

937
00:53:21,480 --> 00:53:26,399
Speaker 1: Islamic tradition, he reveals the Koran to the prophet Mohammed. Yeah,

938
00:53:26,680 --> 00:53:29,560
Speaker 1: and of course there he has other adventures outside of

939
00:53:29,560 --> 00:53:34,520
Speaker 1: these books as well, various myths, legends, even pop cultural examples.

940
00:53:34,960 --> 00:53:37,680
Speaker 1: For instance, Uh, Gabriel shows up in various bits of

941
00:53:37,760 --> 00:53:41,080
Speaker 1: Jewish legend and lore, various bits of Islamic legend and lore,

942
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:44,560
Speaker 1: so he's associated with the moon and early Jewish writings,

943
00:53:44,560 --> 00:53:48,640
Speaker 1: as well as in medieval Christian astrology. In Moroccan traditions,

944
00:53:48,719 --> 00:53:53,319
Speaker 1: he is a Sidna Jebri according to Carol Rose, and

945
00:53:53,440 --> 00:53:55,760
Speaker 1: is said to have delivered to Adam all the tools

946
00:53:55,800 --> 00:53:58,839
Speaker 1: that he needed to survive outside of Paradise, which kind

947
00:53:58,840 --> 00:54:01,960
Speaker 1: of makes him sound like a promethy Is figure. Oh yeah, totally.

948
00:54:02,160 --> 00:54:04,360
Speaker 1: Though also I would say in the Garden of Eden story,

949
00:54:04,560 --> 00:54:09,240
Speaker 1: the serpent itself is very much a Prometheus figure, that's right, Yeah,

950
00:54:09,239 --> 00:54:12,919
Speaker 1: I read that. In Northern English traditions, there's a We've

951
00:54:12,920 --> 00:54:15,560
Speaker 1: mentioned the Wild Hunt and various death dogs and hell

952
00:54:15,600 --> 00:54:18,480
Speaker 1: hounds on the show before. Uh, there are also the

953
00:54:18,480 --> 00:54:22,200
Speaker 1: Gabriel Hounds, which are you know, basically just death dogs

954
00:54:22,200 --> 00:54:24,239
Speaker 1: of the Wild Hunt. And then, of course we have

955
00:54:24,280 --> 00:54:29,200
Speaker 1: some very memorable performances from from recent film history in

956
00:54:29,239 --> 00:54:33,480
Speaker 1: which somebody plays Gabriel. Tilda Swinton played a rebel Gabriel

957
00:54:33,560 --> 00:54:38,720
Speaker 1: in two thousand five's Constantine, which um was maybe yeah,

958
00:54:38,880 --> 00:54:40,600
Speaker 1: I remember it as being fun. I haven't seen it

959
00:54:40,600 --> 00:54:43,640
Speaker 1: since it came out. It's probably an imperfect adaptation of

960
00:54:43,680 --> 00:54:46,080
Speaker 1: the comic book character, but it has a lot of

961
00:54:46,080 --> 00:54:48,719
Speaker 1: fun weirdness in it. I mean Tilda Swinton as a

962
00:54:48,719 --> 00:54:54,560
Speaker 1: rebel angel um, oh god, what's his name? Plays the devil? Oh?

963
00:54:54,600 --> 00:54:56,520
Speaker 1: I played with his name? He played Dino Velvet in

964
00:54:56,800 --> 00:55:05,920
Speaker 1: Um eight millimeter Hold on looking at Vigo Mortenson. No, no,

965
00:55:05,960 --> 00:55:08,239
Speaker 1: you're thinking of your thinking of the next film we're

966
00:55:08,239 --> 00:55:12,440
Speaker 1: going to talk about. Oh oh geez, sorry sorry sorry,

967
00:55:13,760 --> 00:55:17,719
Speaker 1: Peter storm Er. Yes, yes, he plays a wonderful kind

968
00:55:17,719 --> 00:55:24,000
Speaker 1: of like coked up Satan in that film We believe

969
00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:27,840
Speaker 1: in Nothing Gabriel Nothing. Yeah, yeah, he's a lot of

970
00:55:27,880 --> 00:55:30,560
Speaker 1: fun in that. And of course the other big Gabriel

971
00:55:30,600 --> 00:55:33,600
Speaker 1: performance that comes to mind Christopher Walkin as a rebel

972
00:55:33,640 --> 00:55:38,120
Speaker 1: Gabriel in three out of five Prophecy films with with

973
00:55:38,239 --> 00:55:41,200
Speaker 1: Vigo Mortenson as the devil in that one. Yeah, Vigo

974
00:55:41,280 --> 00:55:44,480
Speaker 1: played the devil in the first one, and um, yeah,

975
00:55:44,520 --> 00:55:46,719
Speaker 1: I think what who else was in that? A number

976
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:49,160
Speaker 1: of of actors showed up in that franchise. Oh man,

977
00:55:49,200 --> 00:55:52,239
Speaker 1: I'm seeing lots of names of Virginia Madson of Highlander

978
00:55:52,280 --> 00:55:57,960
Speaker 1: to fame, Eric Stults, Eric Stults. That's right. Yeah, Elias Koteas,

979
00:55:59,239 --> 00:56:02,879
Speaker 1: Amanda Plumber. Wow, and for a written and directed by

980
00:56:03,760 --> 00:56:07,560
Speaker 1: the man who wrote Highlander, so it has strong Highlander

981
00:56:07,600 --> 00:56:13,919
Speaker 1: really Cannon, that's I mean, well, you know, it's like

982
00:56:13,920 --> 00:56:16,120
Speaker 1: like this, Like we've said before, there's the idea that

983
00:56:16,160 --> 00:56:19,440
Speaker 1: to understand the mythology, you have to you have to

984
00:56:19,560 --> 00:56:21,879
Speaker 1: accept all forms of the mythology, have to include all

985
00:56:21,920 --> 00:56:25,640
Speaker 1: forms of the myth, so we ultimately have to incorporate

986
00:56:25,840 --> 00:56:30,120
Speaker 1: um the prophecy films into our understanding of angelic lore.

987
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:32,840
Speaker 1: I was just thinking about something that that's kind of

988
00:56:32,840 --> 00:56:35,839
Speaker 1: about Maybe the sexually isn't all that interesting, just let

989
00:56:35,840 --> 00:56:38,360
Speaker 1: me put it together. So in order to have a

990
00:56:38,400 --> 00:56:41,600
Speaker 1: really good understanding of a mythological tradition, you need to

991
00:56:41,640 --> 00:56:44,080
Speaker 1: know all of the versions of the myth that you

992
00:56:44,120 --> 00:56:45,640
Speaker 1: can and hold them all in your head at the

993
00:56:45,680 --> 00:56:48,080
Speaker 1: same time understand where they come from, how they fit together,

994
00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:50,399
Speaker 1: and how the myth varies in in all of its

995
00:56:50,400 --> 00:56:54,239
Speaker 1: different faces. But as we talked about last time, one

996
00:56:54,280 --> 00:56:56,720
Speaker 1: way in which you have to just pick one version

997
00:56:56,800 --> 00:56:59,600
Speaker 1: of the myth is if you're going to engage in

998
00:56:59,640 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: story helling, right, because you can't tell all versions of

999
00:57:02,160 --> 00:57:04,520
Speaker 1: the story at the same time, that's not enjoyable as

1000
00:57:04,520 --> 00:57:07,480
Speaker 1: a story, So you have to pick one way there.

1001
00:57:07,840 --> 00:57:09,840
Speaker 1: But the other time when you really have to pick

1002
00:57:09,920 --> 00:57:13,000
Speaker 1: one version of the myth is if it's official dogma

1003
00:57:13,239 --> 00:57:15,799
Speaker 1: and people have to believe it. If people have to

1004
00:57:15,880 --> 00:57:18,360
Speaker 1: believe it, they have to believe it one way or another,

1005
00:57:18,840 --> 00:57:21,200
Speaker 1: in which case you also have to pick one version

1006
00:57:21,240 --> 00:57:23,520
Speaker 1: of the story. So I think that's kind of interesting

1007
00:57:23,560 --> 00:57:26,360
Speaker 1: that whether you are trying to keep a child entertained

1008
00:57:26,440 --> 00:57:28,600
Speaker 1: or whether you want to lay down the law, that's

1009
00:57:28,640 --> 00:57:31,120
Speaker 1: when you have to pick one version and ignore all

1010
00:57:31,120 --> 00:57:34,960
Speaker 1: the others. One exception of this that I like that

1011
00:57:35,040 --> 00:57:38,720
Speaker 1: you you see occurring in various treatments, but one of

1012
00:57:38,720 --> 00:57:43,080
Speaker 1: the most noteworthy is probably um that second Batman from

1013
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:46,000
Speaker 1: from Christopher Nolan, the one in which Heath Ledger plays

1014
00:57:46,040 --> 00:57:50,680
Speaker 1: the Joker. Uh. The Joker gives his own origin story

1015
00:57:51,040 --> 00:57:53,600
Speaker 1: what a couple or maybe three different times, and it's

1016
00:57:53,640 --> 00:57:57,440
Speaker 1: always different. It's a play on that. Some say they

1017
00:57:57,520 --> 00:57:59,880
Speaker 1: came from such and such, Some say was this, you know,

1018
00:58:00,640 --> 00:58:05,840
Speaker 1: establishing multiple possible mythologies behind a character, which which I

1019
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:09,000
Speaker 1: kind of like, Well, I think that Joker is uh

1020
00:58:09,400 --> 00:58:11,520
Speaker 1: that to sound really cool. I think that Heath Ledger

1021
00:58:11,600 --> 00:58:16,880
Speaker 1: Joker is supposed to embody chaos and canonical unity is order.

1022
00:58:17,840 --> 00:58:20,160
Speaker 1: Uh you know what that really means is in order

1023
00:58:20,160 --> 00:58:22,760
Speaker 1: to understand the mythology you need to understand the chaos

1024
00:58:22,760 --> 00:58:26,640
Speaker 1: of canonical diversity. Yeah, all right, sounds good to me.

1025
00:58:27,760 --> 00:58:32,760
Speaker 1: Let's let's put that on the tree, Chaos angel to

1026
00:58:32,800 --> 00:58:35,720
Speaker 1: go right at the top um. Because again, yeah, I'd

1027
00:58:35,720 --> 00:58:39,640
Speaker 1: love to see some some Christmas angel tree toppers that

1028
00:58:40,000 --> 00:58:42,600
Speaker 1: invoked some of these other ideas. I mean, there's some

1029
00:58:42,680 --> 00:58:46,480
Speaker 1: really beautiful, weird visions of angels out there, and and

1030
00:58:46,640 --> 00:58:50,520
Speaker 1: certainly you know, traditional artistic treatments, but also more modern stuff.

1031
00:58:50,560 --> 00:58:54,520
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about the various like the seraphims of of

1032
00:58:54,560 --> 00:58:58,440
Speaker 1: Michael W. Kaluda Um. Certainly you could put a Christopher

1033
00:58:58,440 --> 00:59:00,200
Speaker 1: walking up there at the top. I think that would

1034
00:59:00,200 --> 00:59:03,240
Speaker 1: be great. All right, Well, uh, Joe, I think we've

1035
00:59:03,240 --> 00:59:06,400
Speaker 1: completely decorated this Christmas tree for the year. The trimming

1036
00:59:06,480 --> 00:59:09,360
Speaker 1: is complete, and now it really it only remains for

1037
00:59:09,440 --> 00:59:11,880
Speaker 1: us to put some presents underneath this tree. And by that,

1038
00:59:12,040 --> 00:59:14,720
Speaker 1: I of course mean listener mail. We would love to

1039
00:59:14,720 --> 00:59:17,320
Speaker 1: hear from everyone out there if you have some sort

1040
00:59:17,360 --> 00:59:21,720
Speaker 1: of a Christmas tree or holiday decoration tradition that ties

1041
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:23,840
Speaker 1: into what we've discussed here. We'd love to hear from

1042
00:59:23,840 --> 00:59:26,200
Speaker 1: you about it. Uh, you know, it's certainly not just

1043
00:59:26,520 --> 00:59:30,280
Speaker 1: Christmas decorations. I'm oh, I'm very interested in very secular

1044
00:59:30,480 --> 00:59:35,160
Speaker 1: holiday decoration traditions or some version of holiday traditions that

1045
00:59:35,200 --> 00:59:39,520
Speaker 1: also meld with other systems of faith or mythologies or fandoms.

1046
00:59:39,760 --> 00:59:41,440
Speaker 1: I think that's all on the table, and I want

1047
00:59:41,480 --> 00:59:44,400
Speaker 1: to hear about it. Does anybody decorate their tree according

1048
00:59:44,440 --> 00:59:49,440
Speaker 1: to the strict instructions of Hugo Elm with no deviations whatsoever?

1049
00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:52,240
Speaker 1: If so, I want to know about that. Oh, man,

1050
00:59:52,360 --> 00:59:54,560
Speaker 1: I I want to see a Hugo Elm tree. Now,

1051
00:59:54,760 --> 00:59:58,200
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's basically like to come back to

1052
00:59:58,240 --> 01:00:01,080
Speaker 1: the Bible. It's like the the the instructions of how

1053
01:00:01,120 --> 01:00:04,000
Speaker 1: to build the tent that houses the Ark of the Covenant.

1054
01:00:04,040 --> 01:00:07,320
Speaker 1: You know, it's so specific, but surely somebody's recreated it.

1055
01:00:07,840 --> 01:00:13,000
Speaker 1: You shall decorate, as the common daunt says. All right.

1056
01:00:13,400 --> 01:00:14,840
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you want to check out other

1057
01:00:14,840 --> 01:00:17,040
Speaker 1: episodes of Stuff to Blow your mind, you can find

1058
01:00:17,160 --> 01:00:19,840
Speaker 1: is wherever you get your podcasts and wherever that happens

1059
01:00:19,880 --> 01:00:22,919
Speaker 1: to be. We just asked that you rate, review and subscribe.

1060
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Speaker 1: I think you can still go to stuff to Blow

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01:00:24,600 --> 01:00:26,240
Speaker 1: your Mind dot com and that will send you over

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Speaker 1: to our I heart page. And if you go there,

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Speaker 1: there's a place to click for our store and you

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Speaker 1: can buy a sugar or something with our logo on

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Speaker 1: it or a cool monster on it. There are a

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Speaker 1: couple of couple a couple of listener created designs in

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Speaker 1: the mix as well. They're pretty exciting. Huge thanks as

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Speaker 1: always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If

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Speaker 1: you would like to get in touch with us with

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Speaker 1: feedback on this episode or any other suggest topic for

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Speaker 1: the future, just to say hello, you can email us

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Speaker 1: at contact that Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

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Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen

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Speaker 1: me to your favorite shows.