Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Benky's Cabinet of Curiosity is a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world
Speaker 1: is full of the unexplainable, and if history is an
Speaker 1: open book, all of these amazing tales are right there
Speaker 1: on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the Cabinet of Curiosities. When building a house, it's important
Speaker 1: for a contractor to account for such things as the
Speaker 1: size of the room, whether the doorways are tall enough,
Speaker 1: and if there's space in the kitchen for a dishwasher.
Speaker 1: One thing most people don't think about, though, is how
Speaker 1: much weight the floors can handle. Put too many bookshelves
Speaker 1: on the second floor, and you're liable to wind up
Speaker 1: with a library in your living room. Perhaps the people
Speaker 1: of Airfort, Germany should have considered that as well. Airfort
Speaker 1: can trace its roots all the way back to the
Speaker 1: Paleolithic era around a hundred thousand years ago, but i
Speaker 1: wasn't formalized into an actual city until the eighth century.
Speaker 1: It was a popular destination during the Middle Ages, as
Speaker 1: it was located near a major river and was part
Speaker 1: of a cluster of towns involved in the lucrative wode
Speaker 1: plant trade. Airfort may have come from humble beginnings, but
Speaker 1: its history would be forged in the fires a tragedy.
Speaker 1: During World War Two, for example, it was the site
Speaker 1: of two dozen air raids which killed over six hundred people.
Speaker 1: The city has seen countless acts of war, violence and loss.
Speaker 1: For some of the earliest evidence of its devastating past, though,
Speaker 1: look no further than the Church of St. Peter, which
Speaker 1: became the venue of a grizzly and baffling tragedy in
Speaker 1: four during the late twelfth century air for it was
Speaker 1: under the rule of King Henry the sixth. He was
Speaker 1: a powerful and influential leader who would go on to
Speaker 1: capture England's Richard the Lion Hearts and rule Sicily. Later
Speaker 1: in life. He also had to settle the occasional land
Speaker 1: dispute between German nobility and Roman Catholic leadership. Henry's cousin,
Speaker 1: Duke Ludwig the Third, had a bone to pick with
Speaker 1: a man named Conrad of Vittelsbach, who was the Archbishop
Speaker 1: of Mints. They were on opposite sides both philosophically and geographically.
Speaker 1: Conrad had started building a castle near Ludwig's borders and
Speaker 1: Henry's cousin believed it to be a show of aggression,
Speaker 1: except the only reason that Conrad had started building his
Speaker 1: castle in the first place was because he feared that
Speaker 1: Ludwig was planning to attack his territory. Regardless of who
Speaker 1: started it, King Henry had decided to finish it. He
Speaker 1: was on his way to Poland as part of a
Speaker 1: military campaign, and so he decided to stop an effort
Speaker 1: to bring his territorial spat to an end. He chose St.
Speaker 1: Peter's Church as the location for the mediation. Being the
Speaker 1: oldest building in the city, the church was a prominent
Speaker 1: part of air Fort history, providing a serene and understated
Speaker 1: backdrop for the day's events. At least that way is
Speaker 1: the idea. On July, nobles from both sides gathered in
Speaker 1: the church to support their leaders and to defend their
Speaker 1: position before the King. Ludwig, Conrad, and over a hundred
Speaker 1: interested parties were all ushered into the room where King
Speaker 1: Henry waited. Then Conrad and the King stepped into a
Speaker 1: private room to talk, after which Ludwig would get a
Speaker 1: similar opportunity. Now, while Conrad and Henry talked first, Ludwig
Speaker 1: waited with the rest of the crowd, people naturally split
Speaker 1: off into smaller groups, at which point a strange combination
Speaker 1: of factors all converged at once. The weights of the crowd,
Speaker 1: combined with the rotting wooden beams beneath them, resulted in
Speaker 1: a complete collapse of the floor. Almost everyone plunged straight
Speaker 1: down into the latrines below the church, all of which
Speaker 1: fed into a cesspool that was filled to the brim
Speaker 1: with excrements. The King and Conrad managed to hold onto
Speaker 1: the frame of a nearby stained glass window until someone
Speaker 1: was able to get them down. Ludwig also survived, although
Speaker 1: no one is quite sure how. Meanwhile, over sixty of
Speaker 1: the noblemen lost their lives in the accident. Some died
Speaker 1: on impact, but most were believed to have drowned in
Speaker 1: the giant hole of liquid feces beneath the church. Today
Speaker 1: it's known as the Air for Latrine Disaster, an important
Speaker 1: event in the city's history in one with a pretty
Speaker 1: crappy ending. Companies facing tough times often tend to pivot
Speaker 1: to stay afloat. A bookstore might sell coffee to bring
Speaker 1: in new customers, or a startup might change their business
Speaker 1: entirely if they find the competition too fierce, But it
Speaker 1: was tragedy that struck Carpenter and forced him to change
Speaker 1: his business one piece at a time. Ola had started
Speaker 1: a modest woodworking business and mark back in nineteen sixteen.
Speaker 1: He did well for himself, selling everyday tools such as
Speaker 1: ladders and ironing boards. However, the small village he lived
Speaker 1: in was a little off the beaten path and didn't
Speaker 1: get electricity for some time. Without power, Ola often lit
Speaker 1: his workshop with lamps and kept warm during the winter
Speaker 1: months by lighting a stove or a fireplace. One day
Speaker 1: in nineteen twenty four, while his sons were playing in
Speaker 1: the shop, they accidentally set fire to a pile of
Speaker 1: wood shavings. It's set off a blaze that destroyed everything,
Speaker 1: including the building, even the raw wood and his finished products.
Speaker 1: But Ola persevered and rebuilt his workshop even better than before.
Speaker 1: Things ran smoothly for several years after that, it all
Speaker 1: seemed to come together. It seemed business might be looking
Speaker 1: up for him. Sadly, just as he was getting his
Speaker 1: head above water, the Wall Street crash of nineteen nine
Speaker 1: would pull him back under the waves. The Great Depression
Speaker 1: had found its way to his little town and to
Speaker 1: make matters worse, his wife passed away a few years
Speaker 1: later in ninety two, the carpenter and recent widower had
Speaker 1: a decision to make. Could he close his shop and
Speaker 1: walk away from his company, or maybe he could pivot
Speaker 1: and find a new way to bring in business. With
Speaker 1: young mouths to feed and a home to maintain, he
Speaker 1: stopped making ironing boards and ladders. He instead turned to
Speaker 1: cheap wooden items like toys. He made cars, airplanes, and animals,
Speaker 1: all handcrafted and all built to last. But that new
Speaker 1: venture didn't go too well either. In fact, his brother's
Speaker 1: promised to help him out of bankruptcy on the condition
Speaker 1: that he stopped making toys, but ol A just couldn't.
Speaker 1: He loved it too much. But after a while business
Speaker 1: began to turn around. In fact, one of his most
Speaker 1: popular sellers was a wooden duck on wheels that would
Speaker 1: open and close its beak as it was pulled along
Speaker 1: by its string. When World War two arrived, it brought
Speaker 1: even more hardships to Ole's workshop. The first was a
Speaker 1: lack of natural materials to make his toys. With war
Speaker 1: efforts had rendered wood unavailable, which meant no more quacking ducks,
Speaker 1: and the other problem was a second fire, which had
Speaker 1: reduced his workshop to ash once again. But Ola did
Speaker 1: what he always did. He rebuilt it bigger and better
Speaker 1: than before, all with the help of his son, Gottfrid.
Speaker 1: This time though, it wouldn't be a woodworking shop. You see,
Speaker 1: a new technology had taken manufacturing by storm, and the
Speaker 1: one time carpenter believed it was just the thing he
Speaker 1: needed to save his business. It was called plastic injection molding.
Speaker 1: With this new process, molten plastic was injected and pressed
Speaker 1: into a hardened mold to create specific shapes. He had
Speaker 1: seen the machine in action at a fair in Copenhagen.
Speaker 1: After a brief demonstration, the operator handed Ol the fruits
Speaker 1: of its labor, a small plastic object. It wasn't much,
Speaker 1: but the potential was clear. He brought one of the
Speaker 1: machines home and installed it in his factory, and then
Speaker 1: began popping out simple trinkets like Teddy Bears and baby rattles.
Speaker 1: In fact, it was a toy tractor that really put
Speaker 1: a company on the map. For a while. At least,
Speaker 1: business ebbed and flowed as one particular toys popularity faded
Speaker 1: in favor of another. It was a lot for the
Speaker 1: company to stay on top of. But on a trip
Speaker 1: to England in the nineteen fifties, his son Gottfred met
Speaker 1: the head of a major shopping center who explained a
Speaker 1: problem to him. Kids needed a system. Toys at the
Speaker 1: time didn't broaden a child's imagination. They were designed to
Speaker 1: be played with a certain way until the child grew
Speaker 1: bored and moved on to the next thing. And that's
Speaker 1: when Gottfred remembered that first plastic item his father had
Speaker 1: brought home from the fair that day, and with a
Speaker 1: little tweaking, that Humble Toy Company developed their first big hit.
Speaker 1: It was, as the Stranger has suggested, a system, one
Speaker 1: that allowed children to make whatever they wanted, houses, rocket ships, airplanes,
Speaker 1: all simply by combining the similar pieces to one another,
Speaker 1: and kids never grew bored with it. Over the years,
Speaker 1: the shape was modified to include an interlocking tube system
Speaker 1: so that they would hold together better, and from there
Speaker 1: the company skyrocketed. Their system of play has grown over
Speaker 1: the decades into an empire of TV shows, movies, and
Speaker 1: video games, as well as an endless library of physical
Speaker 1: play sets featuring popular characters from every facet of pop culture.
Speaker 1: But it all started with a simple plastic toy and
Speaker 1: an even simpler company motto. Translated into English, the Danish
Speaker 1: phrase meant play well, but ole A Kirk Christiansen thought
Speaker 1: it might work as his company name too, so he
Speaker 1: combined the words into one, and in doing so built
Speaker 1: one of the largest toy companies in the world, one
Speaker 1: brick at a time. Its name Lego. I hope you've
Speaker 1: enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe
Speaker 1: for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the
Speaker 1: show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was
Speaker 1: created by me Aaron Mankie in partnership with how Stuff Works.
Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can
Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the World of Lore
Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,