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Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works. Hey, brain Stuff,

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Speaker 1: I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, and I'm here today to talk about

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Speaker 1: how family feuds can change the world. For example, if

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Speaker 1: only two brothers named Addie and Ruddy Dossler had learned

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Speaker 1: to get along, Germany's Gruder Dossler might have bested Nike

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Speaker 1: as the world's top sports footwear company today. Instead, the

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Speaker 1: brother's bitter feuding resulted in the Gruder Dossler brand that's

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Speaker 1: German for Dossler brothers being split in half and reborn

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Speaker 1: as Adidas and Puma, which today are the world's second

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Speaker 1: and third top sports shoe businesses. Aidolph or Audi Dossler

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Speaker 1: began making shoes in his mother's laundry room shortly after

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Speaker 1: returning home to the Bavarian village of head Skoonocha following

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Speaker 1: World War One. His business did well, and his older

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Speaker 1: brother Rudolf or Ruddy Dossler joined him a few years

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Speaker 1: later to help shy. Audi was the creative force and

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Speaker 1: brains behind the business, while extroverted Rudy was the salesman.

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Speaker 1: The brothers Dossler soon gained to claim for rolling out

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Speaker 1: the first track spikes, but the company really took off

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Speaker 1: after the brothers persuaded American Olympic athlete Jesse Owens to

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Speaker 1: wear their shoes in the nineteen thirty six Berlin Olympics.

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Speaker 1: He did, and he won four gold medals while doing so.

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Speaker 1: Yet it wasn't quite the triumph it should have been

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Speaker 1: for the brothers, as things were beginning to sour between

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Speaker 1: the two. The bad blood had started a few years earlier,

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Speaker 1: in nineteen thirty three, when ADDIE's sixteen year old wife

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Speaker 1: tried to interfere in the business. Rudy was not pleased.

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Speaker 1: It didn't help that Addis and Rudy's families lived together

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Speaker 1: in the same town home, and their wives didn't really

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Speaker 1: get along. But the breaking point came during a World

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Speaker 1: War two air raid. Rudy and his family were tucked

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Speaker 1: into a bomb shelter, and as Addie and his family entered,

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Speaker 1: Addie said, the dirty bastards are back again. He was

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Speaker 1: purportedly commenting on the Royal Air Force planes roaring overhead,

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Speaker 1: but Rudy was positive Addie was referring to his family

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Speaker 1: from their Things quickly unraveled when Rudy was called up

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Speaker 1: to serve in the Nazi military and nineteen forty three,

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Speaker 1: he was sure that Addi had arranged it to have

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Speaker 1: him sent away from the factory. Anxious to get back,

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Speaker 1: Rudy deserted his post in later, when arrested for desertion,

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Speaker 1: he again blamed Addi, who it appears did snitch on him.

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Speaker 1: After a few more scuffles, the two split up the

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Speaker 1: company in ninety eight, moving assets and employees into one

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Speaker 1: of two competing operations located on opposite sides of the

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Speaker 1: Ala River that flowed through the town. Audi renamed his

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Speaker 1: business Adidas, combining his first and last names. Rudy did

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Speaker 1: the same, dubbing his Ruta, though he later changed it

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Speaker 1: to Puma. Soon most of the town citizens were employed

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Speaker 1: by either Adidas or Puma, and these siblings intense rivalry

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Speaker 1: spread throughout the town. If you worked for one company,

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Speaker 1: you did not socialize with employees of the other. Marrying

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Speaker 1: across enemy lines was strictly for Boden. You only shopped

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Speaker 1: in the stores on the same side as the river

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Speaker 1: as the factory in which you were employed. Over time,

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Speaker 1: Adida's far surpassed Puma in sales, thanks to ADDIE's creativity

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Speaker 1: and technical acumen, though Puma also did quite well, But

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Speaker 1: while the two were hard at work competing against one another,

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Speaker 1: they paid no attention to another shoe company, Nike, that

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Speaker 1: was quietly gaining market share. Today, Nike is king of

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Speaker 1: the sports shoe business with seventeen sales of twenty one

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Speaker 1: billion dollars compared to Adidas's ten billion dollars and Puma's

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Speaker 1: two billion. The brothers did speak to one another a

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Speaker 1: few times later in life, but they never reconciled. Both

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Speaker 1: died in the nineteen seventies and were buried at opposite

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Speaker 1: ends of the local cemetery. Their feud finally ended in

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Speaker 1: two thousand nine, when employees of both companies played together

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Speaker 1: in a friendly soccer match. Nonetheless, the Dossler brothers epic

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Speaker 1: fight was named by Time magazine as one of history's

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Speaker 1: top ten family feuds, alongside such notables as Cain and

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Speaker 1: Abel and the hat Fields and McCoy's. Today's episode was

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Speaker 1: written by Melanie Redzeki McManus and produced by Tyler Clang.

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Speaker 1: For more on this topic, check out our sibling podcast,

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History. They have a whole episode on it called

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Speaker 1: Adidas Versus Puma, a tale of two brothers and of course,

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Speaker 1: for lots of other contentious topics, visit our home planet,

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Speaker 1: how stuff Works dot com. H