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Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of

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Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is

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Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,

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Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,

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Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet

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Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Transportation has changed drastically over the last several

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Speaker 1: hundred years, from the steam engines transformation of the railroad

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Speaker 1: industry to the widespread adoption of the automobile. The ways

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Speaker 1: in which we travel get more impressive every year. The

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Speaker 1: rail system in particular has seen some incredible advancements in

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Speaker 1: power and speed. For one engineer in the nineteen seventies,

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Speaker 1: it seemed that the sky was the limit. Charles Osmond

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Speaker 1: Frederick was working for the British rail in nineteen seventy

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Speaker 1: when he had an idea. Frederick had been in charge

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Speaker 1: of wheel performance on the tracks, but thought the rail

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Speaker 1: system as a whole could have been improved. Train tracks

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Speaker 1: were too rigid. The train could only go where the

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Speaker 1: tracks had been placed and nowhere else. But what if

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Speaker 1: the train didn't need the tracks at all? Frederick saw

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Speaker 1: an opportunity to elevate British rail above the competition, so

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Speaker 1: he designed a new type of rail car that didn't

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Speaker 1: use a track system. It didn't drive on roads or

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Speaker 1: over dirt or through mountains either. It flew, which made

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Speaker 1: it sound like another popular form of transportation. However, Frederick's

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Speaker 1: version came with a twist. It utilized nuclear power. According

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Speaker 1: to his schematics, laser energy would trigger a pulse of

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Speaker 1: thermonuclear fusion inside a generator housed in the vehicles center.

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Speaker 1: Electrodes underneath the car would carry that energy through a

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Speaker 1: series of electro magnets, which would bounce the particles around

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Speaker 1: to create lift and thrust. Inside the cabin, passengers would

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Speaker 1: be protected from radiation by a thick metal shield between

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Speaker 1: them and the core below. Oh and one more thing,

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Speaker 1: Frederick's vehicle would be able to fly through space. He

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Speaker 1: designed a flying saucer meant to travel to different planets.

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Speaker 1: It hadn't started out that way, though his original plan

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Speaker 1: was for a lifting platform. The idea to use thermonuclear

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Speaker 1: energy came later in the process. From there, his ambition

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Speaker 1: got the better of him, and the scope of his

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Speaker 1: project practically exploded. Frederick's mind worked in a similar fashion

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Speaker 1: to another dreamer of the time, Arthur Paul Pedrick. Pedrick

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Speaker 1: worked at the UK Patent Office for a number of

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Speaker 1: years before he started submitting his own. He wanted to

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Speaker 1: help people, and he filed patents for a host of

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Speaker 1: random gadgets he had concocted in his later years. One

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Speaker 1: such invention was a cat flap that would detect the

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Speaker 1: color of a cat at his door and allow only

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Speaker 1: his ginger cat into his home, while refusing entry to

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Speaker 1: his neighbor's black cat. He also patented a system of

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Speaker 1: exterior curtains to cover an entire high rise building during

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Speaker 1: a fire. The idea was to smother the fire while

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Speaker 1: driving occupants to safer ground. Pedrick even had a patent

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Speaker 1: for a pipeline network that would carry water and ice

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Speaker 1: from Antarctica to the Australian outback. He wanted to create

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Speaker 1: a storehouse for grains and other foods in a place

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Speaker 1: where they normally didn't grow, and just like Pedrick, Charles

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Speaker 1: Frederick's plans didn't get out of the patent stage either.

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Speaker 1: The patent for his nuclear powered spacecraft was filed on

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Speaker 1: behalf of British rail in nineteen seventy three years later

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Speaker 1: it was granted. However, nobody knew about it for decades

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Speaker 1: until after the Cold War. Any patents submitted during that

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Speaker 1: time with the word nuclear on it was immediately flagged

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Speaker 1: as top secrets. Mentions of it popped up here and

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Speaker 1: there over the years, but it wasn't until two thousand

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Speaker 1: and six when a team of nuclear scientists decided to

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Speaker 1: test the viability of Frederick's design. They quickly realized that

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Speaker 1: what he had come up with was nothing more than

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Speaker 1: a pipe dream. The technology to power a spacecraft in

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Speaker 1: such a manner did not exist in nineteen seventy and

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Speaker 1: it still didn't exist in the twenty one century, but

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Speaker 1: that didn't stop Charles Frederick from dreaming. Big British rail though,

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Speaker 1: didn't seem to agree with him. When the time came

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Speaker 1: to renew the patent in nineteen seventy six, they passed.

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Speaker 1: Apparently that was one train they were happy to miss.

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Speaker 1: Our adolescence is typically spent dreaming of being someone else,

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Speaker 1: anyone else to be cooler or stronger, or in some cases,

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Speaker 1: someone to be ignored, especially if we're prone to spending

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Speaker 1: our free time stuffed in our lockers. Unfortunately, for Mr Nobody.

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Speaker 1: His anonymity only made him even more interesting. Mr Nobody

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Speaker 1: limped into a Toronto hospital in November of nineteen nine nine.

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Speaker 1: He didn't remember what had happened or why he was there,

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Speaker 1: but evidence pointed to a mugging. He had trouble walking

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Speaker 1: and his nose had been broken. He had no wallet

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Speaker 1: or i D. Even the tags on his clothes had

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Speaker 1: been cut off. Doctors ransom tests and asked him a

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Speaker 1: series of questions about what he remembered, which was almost nothing.

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Speaker 1: He spoke about living in Australia despite his clearly British accent,

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Speaker 1: He also muttered the name Philip Stelfen. Soon enough, he

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Speaker 1: was diagnosed with amnesia as a result of a concussion.

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Speaker 1: Strangely enough, however, Steufen, or Mr Nobody as he had

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Speaker 1: become known in the press, had other skills under his belt.

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Speaker 1: The amnesia hadn't taken away his ability to read Latin,

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Speaker 1: nor his fluent French and Italian. Once he'd been examined

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Speaker 1: and stitched up, Steufen left the hospital and found lodging

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Speaker 1: in a homeless shelter. News stations eventually picked up his story,

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Speaker 1: and a kind couple from Ontario offered him a place

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Speaker 1: to stay. Having a permanent home to live in allowed

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Speaker 1: him to apply for welfare, but he still had to

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Speaker 1: submit photos and fingerprints to the government. Sadly, fingerprint and

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Speaker 1: photographic analysis didn't yield any results. As far as the

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Speaker 1: world was concerned, Philip Stealfen didn't exist. He moved around

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Speaker 1: a lot, as you might imagine, spending time in different

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Speaker 1: parts of Canada before settling in Montreal. That was where

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Speaker 1: he found a human rights lawyer named Manuel Asavedo, who

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Speaker 1: helped him apply for Canadian citizenship and a legal birth certificate.

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Speaker 1: With that piece of paper, he could obtain a passport

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Speaker 1: in order to search for his home country. The courts, however,

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Speaker 1: would not grant him citizenship, but he was allowed to

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Speaker 1: remain in Canada if he so chose. During this time,

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Speaker 1: Staufen married Asavedo's daughter, a dual citizen of both Canada

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Speaker 1: and Portugal, and continued to petition for a birth certificate.

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Speaker 1: He also changed his name often. Actually, in October of

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Speaker 1: two thousand one, he went by Keith Ryan. Six months

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Speaker 1: later he changed it to ze Wald's Guide, But in

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Speaker 1: February of two thousand four, yet another alias came to light.

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Speaker 1: George Luqui of France had reported his passport as stolen

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Speaker 1: after his home had been broken into. The culprit, it seemed,

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Speaker 1: was Skyde, who spent ten days in jail as a suspect. Oddly,

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Speaker 1: though the quid refused to press charges and without any

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Speaker 1: real evidence tying him to the crime, Skide was released

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Speaker 1: too much fanfare. After that it was time to move

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Speaker 1: on again. Skyde's wife traveled to Lisbon to set up

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Speaker 1: a new life for both of them there, far away

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Speaker 1: from the press, Skide stayed back to finalize his affairs,

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Speaker 1: but without proper travel documents, he was stuck in Canada. Finally,

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Speaker 1: in two thousand six, he managed to escape, wearing another

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Speaker 1: man's name. The couple eventually divorced, but Skide stuck around

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Speaker 1: in Portugal anyway, probably to avoid the legal troubles that

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Speaker 1: awaited him back in Canada. Then, in June of two

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Speaker 1: thousand seven, Mr Nobody gave an interview with GQ magazine

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Speaker 1: where the truth finally came out. He hadn't been from

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Speaker 1: England or even Australia. He had come from a poor

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Speaker 1: fan only in Romania, but had studied at an elite

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Speaker 1: school when he turned eighteen, he was drafted into the

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Speaker 1: Romanian army for one year. The experience, though, ruined any

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Speaker 1: love he had for his country. At that point, his

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Speaker 1: only goal was to get out to reinvent himself. He

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Speaker 1: underwent operations to change his nose and teeth, and tried

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Speaker 1: everything to obtain citizenship in another country. All he wanted

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Speaker 1: to do was erase Romania from his past. He had

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Speaker 1: been born Cyprian s Guide, a man who tried desperately

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Speaker 1: to reinvent himself by any means necessary. He lied, he cheated,

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Speaker 1: and he stole, But the only thing he couldn't do

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Speaker 1: was escape who he truly was. I hope you've enjoyed

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Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for

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Speaker 1: free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show

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

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Speaker 1: by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.

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Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is

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Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can

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Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the World of Lore

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Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,