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Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history

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Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales are

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Speaker 1: right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. We know it by heart.

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Speaker 1: The iconic lines and songs live inside of us and

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Speaker 1: connect us back to a time when our wildest dreams

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Speaker 1: live just over the rainbow. We scowl at the wicked

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Speaker 1: Witch as she threatens Dorothy and her little dog too.

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Speaker 1: We chuckle as the munchkins push each other out of

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Speaker 1: the way to introduce themselves to their young savior, and

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Speaker 1: we smile as the scarecrow dances his way off his

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Speaker 1: perch and onto the yellow brick road. While it's become

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Speaker 1: a beloved part of cinematic history, read today, the film

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Speaker 1: carries behind it a legacy of conflict, injuries and ballooning

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Speaker 1: budgets that only pulled in three million dollars during its

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Speaker 1: box office run in nine well behind a little film

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Speaker 1: you might have heard of called Gone with the Wind,

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Speaker 1: which was reported to have grossed almost two hundred million

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Speaker 1: dollars by the time it left theaters. But after the

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Speaker 1: success of Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

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Speaker 1: Hollywood saw Fantasy as the next big thing. MGM pulled

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Speaker 1: out all the stops for its adaptation of L. Frank

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Speaker 1: Baum's novel and put Judy Garland, one of the brightest stars,

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Speaker 1: front and center, surrounded by a who's who of talent,

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Speaker 1: Margaret Hamilton's as the Wicked Witch of the West, Roger

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Speaker 1: Boulger as the Scarecrow, and character actor Frank Morgan as

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Speaker 1: the Wizard himself. Actually he was more than that. Yes,

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Speaker 1: he played the Wizard, but Morgan also portrayed the carriage driver,

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Speaker 1: one of the Emerald city guards, and the gatekeeper, you know,

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Speaker 1: the guy who talks to Dorothy and her companions about

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Speaker 1: horses of a different color. But there was one role

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Speaker 1: in the film of special import to Frank Morgan, Professor Marvel,

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Speaker 1: the fortune teller at the beginning of the story. The

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Speaker 1: role is small, only on screen for a few minutes,

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Speaker 1: but there's something special about it that makes it one

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Speaker 1: of the most magical moments ever captured on film. You

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Speaker 1: may remember Professor Marvel's costume from the movie, but in

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Speaker 1: case you can't allow me to jog your memory, he

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Speaker 1: wore checkered pants, a white ruffled shirt with a high

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Speaker 1: collar and a wide dark tie. Over his shirt, he

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Speaker 1: wore a patterned vest and on top of it all,

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Speaker 1: a long coat. The vest looked like repurposed upholstery from

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Speaker 1: an old church, the pants and shirt mismatch of eclectic

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Speaker 1: styles that appeared old even when they were new, and

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Speaker 1: the coat, well, the coat was a serendipitous find. According

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Speaker 1: to Mary Meyer, the publicist of the movie at the time,

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Speaker 1: the coat really brought the whole ensemble together and gave

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Speaker 1: Professor Marvel a look of lost grandeur. He was a

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Speaker 1: man with little to his name, and unlike the Scarecrow

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Speaker 1: or the tin Man, who required custom costumes due to

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Speaker 1: their technical nature's, Professor Marvel's was a hodgepodge of second

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Speaker 1: hand scraps. But the coat, the coat needed to be

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Speaker 1: something just a little bit different from the rest of

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Speaker 1: the costume. The director wanted the character to wear something

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Speaker 1: that had once been nice but was now tattered. Rather

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Speaker 1: than make something new and then weather it, the wardrobe

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Speaker 1: department just searched thrift shops all over Hollywood for the

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Speaker 1: perfect coat, and soon enough they found it. It was

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Speaker 1: a green Prince Albert jacket with wide lapels and long tails.

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Speaker 1: It was the jacket of a man of stature, at

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Speaker 1: least it would have been at the turn of the century.

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Speaker 1: Now it was a hand me down for a fraud

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Speaker 1: stir in a Hollywood fantasy, and it was perfect. Frank

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Speaker 1: Morgan arrived at the studio for test shots a few

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Speaker 1: months before his scheduled filming date. A costume and makeup

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Speaker 1: people needed reference photos to use when it came time

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Speaker 1: for him to shoot his scenes. They styled his hair

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Speaker 1: and dressed him in the various pieces they had acquired

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Speaker 1: to round out Professor Marvel's unique look, finishing it all

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Speaker 1: off with that coat. It was on one hot afternoon

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Speaker 1: when Morgan decided to empty his pockets to lighten his load,

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Speaker 1: and he came across something. It was a name sewn

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Speaker 1: into the inside of the jacket pocket. No one could

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Speaker 1: believe it. The costumer contacted the coats tailor back in

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Speaker 1: Chicago to verify the discovery, and, as it turned out,

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Speaker 1: a piece of clothing they owned did in fact belong

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Speaker 1: to someone intimately tied to the film they were working on.

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Speaker 1: The ratty coat hanging on Frank Morgan's shoulders had belonged

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Speaker 1: to a man from New York who had passed away

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Speaker 1: some years before. He had once advocated for the women's

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Speaker 1: suffrage movement, and he had given the world fourteen fantastic

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Speaker 1: tales of people and places living somewhere over the rainbow.

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Speaker 1: Frank Morgan's coat had been made for the man who had,

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Speaker 1: in a way given him the most important role of

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Speaker 1: his career, a man named L. Frank Baum. We've seen

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Speaker 1: them on TV, mediums who claim they can speak to

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Speaker 1: the ghosts of deceased loved ones. Perhaps it's a letter

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Speaker 1: of the alphabet that triggers them, or a smell or

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Speaker 1: someone's name, whatever it is. The person on the other

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Speaker 1: side is always astounded by how much the medium claims

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Speaker 1: to know. You'd think they were really talking to the dead.

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Speaker 1: We know better now, and we're able to see through

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Speaker 1: a lot of the techniques. Mediums used to dupe their

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Speaker 1: audiences how they speak in generalities and convinced the other

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Speaker 1: person to give up more information without even realizing it.

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Speaker 1: But at the turn of the century, Hans had fooled

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Speaker 1: them all. He wasn't a medium, but he had convinced

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Speaker 1: everyone that he had all the answers. Complicated equations, difficult

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Speaker 1: words to spell musical riddles. Hans knew it all. He

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Speaker 1: traveled all over Germany with his translator, Wilhelm von Austin,

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Speaker 1: right there beside him. Hans was known to gather crowds

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Speaker 1: of men, women, and children who tried to push him

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Speaker 1: to the limits of his expertise, and every time he

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Speaker 1: came out on top, no one could stump him. One man, however,

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Speaker 1: thought that he could catch him. Dr Oscar Funks was

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Speaker 1: a psychologist who wasn't convinced of Hans his talents. He

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Speaker 1: saw something else going on while everyone was distracted by

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Speaker 1: his big brain. Doctor Funks discovered Hans didn't know anything

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Speaker 1: at all. I mean, he knew some things, but not

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Speaker 1: as much as everyone. But Hans, like today's TV mediums,

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Speaker 1: had mastered the art of cold reading. When he was

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Speaker 1: close to an answer, he'd watched the person's body language change.

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Speaker 1: If they tensed up, if their lip twitched, or their

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Speaker 1: hands shook, he knew he had them right where he

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Speaker 1: wanted them. He'd give his answer based on that shift,

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Speaker 1: and over of the time he was right. Doctor funkst

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Speaker 1: published his findings to better educate the crowds coming to

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Speaker 1: see Hans perform but Hans didn't care, neither did the

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Speaker 1: throngs of people coming to see him. He continued to

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Speaker 1: travel around Germany for several years until his translator died

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Speaker 1: in nineteen o nine. But some good did arise out

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Speaker 1: of doctor funkst work. He came to the conclusion that

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Speaker 1: every person gave off the same body language Hans had noticed.

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Speaker 1: No matter how hard they trying to suppress it, there

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Speaker 1: was no way to hide it, and so his work

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Speaker 1: is still used by comparative psychologists today. When they conduct studies,

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Speaker 1: they keep their subjects in complete isolation, so they can't

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Speaker 1: read each other's mannerisms and ticks. In some studies, computers

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Speaker 1: are used to administer questions and record the answers. Since

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Speaker 1: they're incapable of emotion. It's called the clever Hants effect. Today,

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Speaker 1: a commonplace to find it an action is in drug

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Speaker 1: sniffing dogs used by police. They're often given subconscious cues

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Speaker 1: by their handlers to find drugs where they don't exist.

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Speaker 1: But that still leaves a big question unanswered about Hans

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Speaker 1: and his special skills. If he was so good at

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Speaker 1: it and made so much money from it, why did

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Speaker 1: he stop. Why didn't he just hire another translator. The answer,

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Speaker 1: it turns out, is simple, because Hans couldn't hire anyone.

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Speaker 1: He couldn't talk, at least not with his mouth. He

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Speaker 1: gave all of his responses by using his foot, stomping

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Speaker 1: out the answers to math questions and musical riddles, among others.

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Speaker 1: He'd been taught to do simple algebra, tell time, read spell,

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Speaker 1: and calculate for actions. All of this sounds pretty basic,

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Speaker 1: I know, like something any adult or even a child

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Speaker 1: could do. So what made Hans so special? It's really simple.

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Speaker 1: Hans wasn't an adult. He wasn't even a child. Hans,

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Speaker 1: you see, was a horse, and his translator, Wilhelm von Austin,

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Speaker 1: was also his trainer. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided

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Speaker 1: tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting

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Speaker 1: Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me

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Speaker 1: Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make

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Speaker 1: another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast,

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Speaker 1: book series, and television show, and you can learn all

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Speaker 1: about it over at the World of Lore dot com.

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Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious,