WEBVTT - Short Stuff: POW Olympics

0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:06.840
<v Speaker 1>Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff. I'm Charles. Wait,

0:00:06.960 --> 0:00:08.800
<v Speaker 1>I'm Josh. There's Charles.

0:00:09.200 --> 0:00:09.520
<v Speaker 2>Wow.

0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:11.800
<v Speaker 1>This is off to a good start already, this is

0:00:11.880 --> 0:00:14.960
<v Speaker 1>short stuff. Jerry's here too, YadA YadA.

0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:19.680
<v Speaker 2>Let's go all right, this is about the Pow Olympics.

0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:21.959
<v Speaker 2>We're going to hop in the al wayback machine and

0:00:21.960 --> 0:00:30.400
<v Speaker 2>go back to nineteen forty four and Voldenbruke in western Poland,

0:00:31.160 --> 0:00:37.080
<v Speaker 2>where Polish military officers were being held captive as POWs

0:00:37.640 --> 0:00:41.519
<v Speaker 2>by the Nazis. But the Nazis were like, hey, be

0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:44.840
<v Speaker 2>glad you're here, because it's not so bad. We treat

0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:48.199
<v Speaker 2>you guys pretty well. We adhere to the Geneva Convention

0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:51.199
<v Speaker 2>for the most part. And if you'll notice, there are

0:00:51.200 --> 0:00:55.200
<v Speaker 2>no death chambers and things like that here. You've got

0:00:55.240 --> 0:00:59.520
<v Speaker 2>an orchestra, you're taking classes. Treat us well after the war.

0:00:59.560 --> 0:01:01.360
<v Speaker 2>Because I think I see where this whole thing's ended.

0:01:02.360 --> 0:01:04.840
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, did you did you say that the POWs were

0:01:04.840 --> 0:01:05.640
<v Speaker 1>all officers?

0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:06.760
<v Speaker 2>I did?

0:01:07.000 --> 0:01:10.840
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so that that that was why this pow camp

0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:15.560
<v Speaker 1>was called offlog two c Offlog is derived from a

0:01:15.560 --> 0:01:18.240
<v Speaker 1>German word. I think it might be slang for an

0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:19.560
<v Speaker 1>officer's prison camp.

0:01:21.000 --> 0:01:23.920
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, it's kind of like the Great Escape. Okay, sure,

0:01:23.959 --> 0:01:25.840
<v Speaker 2>remember they had it pretty easy in that camp.

0:01:26.120 --> 0:01:28.280
<v Speaker 1>Right, So, yeah, I think that was there were a

0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:30.720
<v Speaker 1>lot of political reasons why they were taking it easy

0:01:30.760 --> 0:01:34.800
<v Speaker 1>on them and following the Geneva Convention. But doesn't it

0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:37.120
<v Speaker 1>just feel dirty to give the Nazis credit for anything?

0:01:37.920 --> 0:01:39.880
<v Speaker 2>No, for sure, but I think it was one of

0:01:39.920 --> 0:01:43.399
<v Speaker 2>those cases where I wasn't really joking when I said

0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:47.119
<v Speaker 2>they were like, hey, remember this after the war, because

0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:51.880
<v Speaker 2>they were trying to set themselves up for being treated

0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:55.200
<v Speaker 2>okay after the war, and also to draw comparisons to

0:01:55.480 --> 0:01:58.840
<v Speaker 2>at the time Russian prison camps and saying like they're

0:01:58.880 --> 0:02:02.680
<v Speaker 2>the they're the really bad ones. This one isn't so bad,

0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:05.400
<v Speaker 2>specifically here in Poland.

0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:10.360
<v Speaker 1>So part of that was allowing of an Olympic Games

0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:15.200
<v Speaker 1>to be held at Waldenburg. It was a Pow Olympics

0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:19.280
<v Speaker 1>that was organized and carried out in cooperation with the

0:02:19.320 --> 0:02:22.360
<v Speaker 1>German captors that were supposed to be in London and

0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:25.320
<v Speaker 1>then got canceled and then popped up again in the

0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:27.160
<v Speaker 1>at the Waldenburg Pow camp.

0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.959
<v Speaker 2>Right. Yeah. I doubt if the real Olympic Games people

0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:34.600
<v Speaker 2>know about it, although you never know, you never know.

0:02:35.200 --> 0:02:37.600
<v Speaker 2>I mean, we know about it so well.

0:02:37.639 --> 0:02:40.519
<v Speaker 1>I know that I know that the Chinese held a

0:02:41.120 --> 0:02:46.800
<v Speaker 1>nineteen fifty two POW Olympics at a camp in Korea,

0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:51.000
<v Speaker 1>in North Korea with Korean War captives as a huge

0:02:51.040 --> 0:02:55.239
<v Speaker 1>propaganda coup. Like they kept records, they followed the IOC

0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:58.640
<v Speaker 1>instructions to a t, and they let the world know

0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:01.399
<v Speaker 1>about it. So I wouldn't surprised that the Nazis told

0:03:01.440 --> 0:03:04.399
<v Speaker 1>people that this was going on as a pr thing.

0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:08.880
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and since we're talking about other Pow Olympics, got

0:03:08.919 --> 0:03:11.880
<v Speaker 2>it to talk about nineteen forty because they were supposed

0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:14.560
<v Speaker 2>to be in Tokyo. World War II was just getting

0:03:14.560 --> 0:03:18.639
<v Speaker 2>cranking up there, so they moved it to Helsinki, Finland,

0:03:18.760 --> 0:03:21.600
<v Speaker 2>and then they canceled those altogether. And there was a

0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:27.200
<v Speaker 2>German POW camp in Langfasa, Germany that had they called

0:03:27.240 --> 0:03:30.079
<v Speaker 2>it the International Prisoner of War Games, but that one

0:03:30.720 --> 0:03:32.840
<v Speaker 2>was a little bit different. That one was in secret.

0:03:34.040 --> 0:03:37.480
<v Speaker 2>There would have been penalties by the German captors for

0:03:38.040 --> 0:03:43.040
<v Speaker 2>holding that Olympics. So somehow they managed to pull off

0:03:43.120 --> 0:03:46.160
<v Speaker 2>a secret Olympics nineteen forty.

0:03:46.280 --> 0:03:49.720
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I guess the captors just thought they were watching

0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:51.560
<v Speaker 1>a basketball game or something like that.

0:03:52.800 --> 0:03:55.320
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Maybe, and that weird Olympic flag with the rings

0:03:55.400 --> 0:03:57.520
<v Speaker 2>was I don't know, just for fun.

0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:00.200
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, let's take a break, chuck.

0:04:01.520 --> 0:04:02.640
<v Speaker 2>All right, let's do it.

0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:09.320
<v Speaker 1>And job.

0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:32.000
<v Speaker 2>All right. So geez, we've now covered very quickly two

0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:35.600
<v Speaker 2>Olympic game POW Olympic games, but we're gonna go back

0:04:35.600 --> 0:04:38.640
<v Speaker 2>to the one in nineteen forty four and voted in

0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:43.240
<v Speaker 2>book because they, like you said, had the permission of

0:04:43.279 --> 0:04:48.160
<v Speaker 2>the Nazis to do this, and it was It kind

0:04:48.160 --> 0:04:49.680
<v Speaker 2>of became one of those stories of the war, kind

0:04:49.720 --> 0:04:55.560
<v Speaker 2>of like the Christmas where the ceasefire happened on Christmas Eve. Yeah,

0:04:55.600 --> 0:04:57.560
<v Speaker 2>and they got together. It sort of has that air

0:04:57.600 --> 0:04:58.080
<v Speaker 2>about it.

0:04:58.160 --> 0:04:59.960
<v Speaker 1>Man, that's just such an amazing story.

0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:00.640
<v Speaker 2>It was.

0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:06.440
<v Speaker 1>So Yeah, they are probably the most famous long long

0:05:06.520 --> 0:05:09.800
<v Speaker 1>Losser and Woldenburg are about the most famous of all

0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:13.200
<v Speaker 1>the POW games, so we know the most about them.

0:05:13.800 --> 0:05:18.240
<v Speaker 1>In Waldenburg's they had a bunch of different events, like

0:05:18.279 --> 0:05:20.400
<v Speaker 1>they really kind of followed the Olympics at the time

0:05:20.440 --> 0:05:25.680
<v Speaker 1>to a t. There was soccer aka football, handball, basketball,

0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:29.640
<v Speaker 1>track and field, but there were some events that they're like,

0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:32.640
<v Speaker 1>we're gonna draw the line at that because we don't

0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:35.080
<v Speaker 1>trust you. Still, this is a pow camp.

0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:38.600
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, it's pretty funny. Of course, they were like, maybe

0:05:38.640 --> 0:05:43.440
<v Speaker 2>nothing where you shoot an arrow, so archery was out.

0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:46.800
<v Speaker 2>They said maybe nothing where you hold a sword, so

0:05:47.000 --> 0:05:51.040
<v Speaker 2>fencing was out. And then they said, beer, wow, we're

0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:54.000
<v Speaker 2>at it. Let's get rid of the javelin because I imagine

0:05:53.880 --> 0:05:56.479
<v Speaker 2>that would not feel good in the chest. And it

0:05:56.560 --> 0:06:00.520
<v Speaker 2>seems to me that practicing for pole vaulting, it's just

0:06:00.560 --> 0:06:04.599
<v Speaker 2>another way of saying practicing for getting over that fence

0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:05.239
<v Speaker 2>over there.

0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:09.560
<v Speaker 1>Right, tough to slip it past them while you're having

0:06:09.600 --> 0:06:12.120
<v Speaker 1>an Olympics. They also had to say no boxing, not

0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:15.760
<v Speaker 1>because there was any they were worried about it were

0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:18.040
<v Speaker 1>getting beaten up, I guessed by the boxers. They were

0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:20.960
<v Speaker 1>worried about the boxers killing one another because they were

0:06:21.080 --> 0:06:23.920
<v Speaker 1>again even though they were officers, these were held in

0:06:23.960 --> 0:06:27.560
<v Speaker 1>pow camps, and so the boxers were essentially too frail

0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:30.360
<v Speaker 1>to box. It was just too dangerous for the boxers.

0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:34.440
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and we can't not mention the great great World

0:06:34.440 --> 0:06:39.119
<v Speaker 2>War two soccer film Victory with Sylvester Stallone and Michael

0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:40.040
<v Speaker 2>Caine and.

0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:42.040
<v Speaker 1>Pele Plee was in it.

0:06:42.800 --> 0:06:46.360
<v Speaker 2>Plee was in it neat what year was this?

0:06:45.920 --> 0:06:46.080
<v Speaker 1>Uh?

0:06:46.360 --> 0:06:48.560
<v Speaker 2>This is in the eighties. But it told the story

0:06:48.640 --> 0:06:53.279
<v Speaker 2>of a soccer match that was held between the Nazis

0:06:53.880 --> 0:06:58.720
<v Speaker 2>and the POW's. But there was an escape plan at halftime.

0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:03.120
<v Speaker 2>They were to bust out dig they had people digging

0:07:03.160 --> 0:07:04.880
<v Speaker 2>in and then we're going to bust into the locker

0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:07.880
<v Speaker 2>room and get them out. And I'm not gonna spoil it,

0:07:07.960 --> 0:07:10.640
<v Speaker 2>but let's just say they are faced at halftime with

0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:15.240
<v Speaker 2>the choice do we escape during this game or do

0:07:15.360 --> 0:07:17.520
<v Speaker 2>we go back on that field and try and beat

0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:18.679
<v Speaker 2>the Nazis at soccer?

0:07:19.360 --> 0:07:20.240
<v Speaker 1>Uh? You escape.

0:07:21.320 --> 0:07:26.320
<v Speaker 2>It's unequivocal, great, great movie, one of the great sports movies.

0:07:26.440 --> 0:07:29.200
<v Speaker 1>It sounds like it was remade as The Longest Yard.

0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:31.240
<v Speaker 1>Isn't that kind of like the plot of that too?

0:07:32.080 --> 0:07:35.880
<v Speaker 2>Hmmm? I mean no, it wasn't like a remake. But

0:07:35.880 --> 0:07:38.800
<v Speaker 2>The Longest Yard was That was the Burt Reynolds football

0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:43.200
<v Speaker 2>movie about prison Adam game. Yeah, well, then remade again

0:07:43.240 --> 0:07:44.920
<v Speaker 2>by Adam Sandler. But I don't think there was an

0:07:45.040 --> 0:07:46.800
<v Speaker 2>escape thing in the Longest Yard? Was there?

0:07:47.160 --> 0:07:48.640
<v Speaker 1>That's what I thought. That's why I said that. I

0:07:48.680 --> 0:07:50.480
<v Speaker 1>thought there might be, But maybe I just put that

0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:52.480
<v Speaker 1>in there to entertain myself because I was bored.

0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:56.560
<v Speaker 2>It's been it's been. Thanks a lot. Appreciate that.

0:07:57.040 --> 0:07:59.240
<v Speaker 1>No, no, no, I mean with the movie, not with

0:07:59.320 --> 0:08:00.240
<v Speaker 1>your anecdote.

0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:05.000
<v Speaker 2>Oh okay, no, I don't think there was, unless I'm wrong.

0:08:05.000 --> 0:08:07.080
<v Speaker 2>I think Along as Yar was just about a football game.

0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:08.679
<v Speaker 2>But I may be wrong. It's been a minute.

0:08:08.760 --> 0:08:10.840
<v Speaker 1>Okay, Well, this conversations boring. Let's move on.

0:08:13.080 --> 0:08:14.360
<v Speaker 2>Still unplays a goalkeeper?

0:08:14.680 --> 0:08:15.160
<v Speaker 1>Does he really?

0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:16.080
<v Speaker 2>True? Yeah?

0:08:16.160 --> 0:08:17.360
<v Speaker 1>Does he take one in the face?

0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:20.160
<v Speaker 2>Uh? Well, they had to teach him. He wasn't very

0:08:20.160 --> 0:08:23.239
<v Speaker 2>good at it, but they needed him on the escape team.

0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.240
<v Speaker 2>So he was not the most gifted goalkeeper. But they

0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:28.800
<v Speaker 2>had Pele, and they had all these other English football

0:08:28.800 --> 0:08:31.680
<v Speaker 2>stars from the time that I didn't know about. But

0:08:31.720 --> 0:08:34.480
<v Speaker 2>my friend Justin's like, oh that was Bobby's something something

0:08:34.559 --> 0:08:35.160
<v Speaker 2>and whatever.

0:08:36.160 --> 0:08:38.640
<v Speaker 1>I hadn't realized Pele had been a pow.

0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:42.640
<v Speaker 2>Oh my god, we just stop.

0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:44.560
<v Speaker 1>Well, wait a minute, wait a minut. Before we stop,

0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:48.960
<v Speaker 1>we have to say that. In addition to those like basketball, handball,

0:08:49.040 --> 0:08:51.560
<v Speaker 1>track and field, that kind of stuff, they actually held

0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:57.160
<v Speaker 1>cultural events as part of the Olympic competitions at Woldenburg

0:08:57.200 --> 0:09:03.640
<v Speaker 1>in nineteen forty four for like sculpture and painting and chess,

0:09:03.679 --> 0:09:06.520
<v Speaker 1>and you would just normally think like, okay, they were

0:09:06.559 --> 0:09:08.440
<v Speaker 1>just trying to round some stuff out. Maybe they were

0:09:08.480 --> 0:09:11.440
<v Speaker 1>trying to replace the javelin event with something else, so

0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:14.800
<v Speaker 1>they came up in chess. No. From nineteen twelve to

0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:18.520
<v Speaker 1>nineteen fifty two, the Olympics awarded one hundred and fifty

0:09:18.559 --> 0:09:22.040
<v Speaker 1>one medals to original works in the fine arts. Like

0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:27.600
<v Speaker 1>you you could go see a sculpture exhibit and a

0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:33.120
<v Speaker 1>long jump competition in the same place, maybe even during

0:09:33.160 --> 0:09:35.800
<v Speaker 1>that fifty years or forty years, you can see a

0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:38.240
<v Speaker 1>sculpture battle, a sculpt off.

0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:41.760
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I had no idea, So that was sort of

0:09:41.520 --> 0:09:43.720
<v Speaker 2>on My big one takeaway out of this whole thing

0:09:44.320 --> 0:09:47.800
<v Speaker 2>was that they actually, for four decades gave out Olympic

0:09:47.840 --> 0:09:51.000
<v Speaker 2>medals in the arts. Yeah, so cool.

0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:54.080
<v Speaker 1>It is very cool. Its a surprising little factoid that

0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:56.280
<v Speaker 1>I had not expected to learn from this one.

0:09:56.800 --> 0:09:59.560
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. That, and that Pele was a POW in nineteen

0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:00.679
<v Speaker 2>eighty three or whatever.

0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:04.720
<v Speaker 1>Right, So hats off to everybody who participated in Olympics

0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:07.439
<v Speaker 1>and Pow camps. It is kind of the triumph of

0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:10.240
<v Speaker 1>the human spirit. You know what, I mean totally like

0:10:10.280 --> 0:10:16.080
<v Speaker 1>the purest form of Olympic competition. That's right, And I

0:10:16.120 --> 0:10:18.679
<v Speaker 1>guess since Chuck is agreeing with me, then we should

0:10:18.720 --> 0:10:23.000
<v Speaker 1>just go ahead and say this short stuff is out.

0:10:23.600 --> 0:10:25.920
<v Speaker 1>Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio.

0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:29.600
<v Speaker 2>For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:32.720
<v Speaker 2>Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.