WEBVTT - The Ballad of Pancho Barnes 0:00:00.520 --> 0:00:04.600 Ridiculous Crime is a production of iHeartRadio Yo, Elizabeth Duttons 0:00:04.800 --> 0:00:07.120 Zaren Vernet. You got a second, I got a question, Chris. 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:10.040 I've been waiting to see you. Yeah, okay, thank god. 0:00:10.280 --> 0:00:15.000 Do you know what's ridiculous? Yes? I knew you would know. Okay, 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:18.880 it's a mashup. It's okay, I take it back. Let 0:00:18.960 --> 0:00:22.479 me let me read you some of the descriptions and 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:25.160 then you can fill in the blanks for me. Oh yay. 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:30.440 A tribute to the mastery of crisp spiced curled potato 0:00:31.120 --> 0:00:36.360 with hints of cayenne and paprika. This innovative blank preserves 0:00:36.400 --> 0:00:40.640 the distinctive and authentic tasting notes of the traditional blank 0:00:41.479 --> 0:00:46.640 m potato crispy holds the flavor of blank. Let me 0:00:46.640 --> 0:00:50.000 give you another one, okay. Honoring the rich tradition of 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:54.880 salted potato shapes, this premium blank features a blend of 0:00:54.920 --> 0:00:58.200 fine kosh or salt and sugar, a subtle homage to 0:00:58.240 --> 0:01:03.280 the simple perfection of blank. Um. Is it a pair 0:01:03.280 --> 0:01:06.600 of shoes? No, it's let me just let me just 0:01:06.720 --> 0:01:09.560 break it to you. It's not pretty. Is it a liquor? Yes? 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:12.000 Oh okay, So that's a liquor. I'm close. It's something 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:17.960 you drink. Yeah, and it's potato flavor. It's a vodka. 0:01:18.080 --> 0:01:21.400 So we're on the right track now, Vodka potato flavor 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:26.080 or honoring potatoes. So there's two, no, there's two kinds. 0:01:26.680 --> 0:01:30.800 One is all about the you know, spicy curled potato 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:33.680 with cayenne and paprika, and the other one is the 0:01:33.800 --> 0:01:40.360 salted potatoes shapes salt sugar. So I'm telling you today 0:01:40.400 --> 0:01:48.520 about Arbie's vodka. What one is arbie curly fry vodka, 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:51.800 and then they also have a crinkle fry flavored vodka. 0:01:52.200 --> 0:01:55.280 Oh god, they don't have like a meat sauce flavored vodka. No, 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:59.200 but they have like bloody mary recipes you can and 0:01:59.240 --> 0:02:01.800 then you shove the fries up in the top, just 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:04.280 like as like a little dressing on the top curly hair. 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:07.000 What is going on in the boardrooms of these businesses 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:10.960 that they're like, look, we got a moment. What happens? 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:14.480 They gather around, they're like, check this out. Ridiculous crime 0:02:14.520 --> 0:02:18.200 is recording again and Elizabeth needs a mashup. Let's get 0:02:18.240 --> 0:02:20.600 on these guys, and they like take their jackets off 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:22.880 and loosen the ties and the gals in the room 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:25.600 who are really the bosses, you know, they just like 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:28.959 crack their knuckles. They get up to the whiteboard, huh, 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:31.640 start scribbling them out, and they're like, Okay, she's gonna 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.800 love this. God. Yeah, so that makes absolutely no sense. 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:39.440 No one will buy this five French Fry vodka eighty proof. 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:44.280 Oh perfect, It's all sold out. If you go to 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:48.200 Arby's Vodka dot com. The bottles are like they're supposed 0:02:48.240 --> 0:02:50.480 to be like sixty bucks when they say sold out, 0:02:50.480 --> 0:02:52.359 do they make like five hundred? And then like that's 0:02:52.360 --> 0:02:55.639 why do they make any at all? Oh good question, Elizabeth, 0:02:55.840 --> 0:03:01.280 Like your suspicions, I am very suspicious. Yeah, if you 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:05.120 got a second, I do I have one for you? Yes? Okay, 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:09.280 this this is right up your alley, right right up 0:03:09.280 --> 0:03:13.600 my shooter alley at the shooter alley. Jagger Hoover and 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:17.000 the FBI and the US Air Force once went to 0:03:17.080 --> 0:03:20.440 war against one woman. Oh yes, this one woman. She 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:23.720 was an aviation pioneer. But she'd run a foul of 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:28.280 the decency police because this one woman. Dare dared, Elizabeth 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:31.000 to let men and women have fun at a place 0:03:31.040 --> 0:03:54.200 called the Happy Bottom Riding Club. This is Ridiculous Crime, 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:57.920 a podcast about absurd and outrageous capers, heights and cons. 0:03:58.160 --> 0:04:07.520 It's always sent murder free and one ridiculous Elizabeth Elizabeth. Today, 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:09.360 I got a special one for you. I told you this. 0:04:09.440 --> 0:04:11.320 I think you're gonna like this lady. She's one of 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:17.479 my favorite American legends. Okay, her name Poncho Barnes. Poncho Barnes, 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:20.440 that's a great name. Okay. To give you a sense 0:04:20.440 --> 0:04:22.600 of her, I'm just gonna lay out her life philosophy. 0:04:22.720 --> 0:04:24.560 She used to say, I thought you'd dig this when 0:04:24.560 --> 0:04:27.520 you have a chance. She's happy. Oh yeah, that's good. 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:29.680 I like that. So you're ready to hear the Ballad 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:34.440 of Poncho Barnes. She was born Florence Leontine Low. She 0:04:34.480 --> 0:04:37.799 came into this world on July twenty second, nineteen oh one. Basically, 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:40.080 you know, almost with the New century. She came by 0:04:40.120 --> 0:04:43.240 her adventurous spirit naturally. Her grandfather was Thaddius S. C. 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:44.920 Low in a case you don't know, who was an 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:48.320 inventor who specialized in balloons, and he was an aviation pioneer. 0:04:48.360 --> 0:04:51.640 And you're wondering, how is she an avination pioneer. Great question, Elizabeth. 0:04:52.080 --> 0:04:54.400 He was the founder of the Army of the Potomac's 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:57.279 Balloon Corps, which means he fought for the Union Army 0:04:57.360 --> 0:05:00.520 under Lincoln, which also means his balloon War affair was 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:06.400 the start of American military aviation. Wow, father of right. Yeah, 0:05:06.480 --> 0:05:10.680 So her grandfather, Daddiuslowe also inspired her, this young tomboy 0:05:10.800 --> 0:05:13.359 to dream of her own life among the clouds. So 0:05:13.360 --> 0:05:15.080 when she's ten years old, he takes her to her 0:05:15.080 --> 0:05:17.880 first air show. She loves it. Now, you gotta keep 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:20.039 in mind the Right brothers had just flown for the 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:22.880 first time when she was three years old. Now seven 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:27.440 years later, they are aviation pioneers, right. So she sees 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:30.400 this and she's like, oh, I gotta be in the sky. Right, 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:32.400 But first she's a young tom boy. She's like, I 0:05:32.440 --> 0:05:35.240 should run away from home. So she runs away from home. Now, 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:37.159 she grew up in southern California in a town called 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:40.679 sam Marino. So for Pancho Barnes, running away meant grabbing 0:05:40.680 --> 0:05:44.160 a horse and riding to Tijuana. That sounds great, right. Yeah. 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:45.960 She was like, you know, in southern California back when 0:05:45.960 --> 0:05:52.000 was mostly ranches, exactly orange orchards. So she just, you know, 0:05:52.160 --> 0:05:54.360 takes off for Tijuana and has a good old time. 0:05:54.400 --> 0:05:56.480 Her family finally catches up her and they force her 0:05:56.480 --> 0:05:58.760 back to America. They enroll her in a religious school. 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:00.960 How old was she when she about twelve thirteen, so 0:06:01.080 --> 0:06:03.960 one of many religious schools she goes to. Finally she 0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:06.800 graduates and she's like, oh, I want to become a veterinarian. 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:08.599 And her mother's like, no, no, no, that's not a 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:10.919 right profession for a young lady. And she's like, but 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:12.760 I really love animals, and she's like, no, no, no no, 0:06:13.240 --> 0:06:14.880 We're gonna put you in art school. That's a good 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:17.000 thing for a lady who's creative in fiery like you. 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:19.039 And her grandma's like no, no no, no, no, no art school, 0:06:19.040 --> 0:06:20.880 no no, no no. We're gonna get her married, like 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:24.039 all good wayward girls should be. So they arrange a marriage. 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:26.440 At this point, she's nineteen years old. The marriage is 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:29.840 to this reverend. It doesn't last long, it doesn't sound 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:32.440 like a good match. They were intimate just once on 0:06:32.480 --> 0:06:35.800 their wedding night. That's it. And eventually a couple years later, 0:06:35.839 --> 0:06:38.840 her mother passes away, and this kind of sets something 0:06:38.880 --> 0:06:42.039 loose and poncho. She's like, I gotta get free. You know. 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.279 It reawakens in her that sense of longing for adventure. 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:49.039 She runs off from her husband Rome's America, starts having fairs. 0:06:49.080 --> 0:06:52.040 She's also a footloose and fancy free young heiress, a 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:55.000 tomboy with money to spend because when her mother died 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:58.400 she left her about eight million dollars in twenty twenty 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:01.760 three dollars. Whoa, So she uses her inheritance to party 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:06.680 and enjoy. Yeah, she's twenty three years. I was sorry 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:09.320 when she when this first happens, she gets married, she's nineteen. 0:07:09.440 --> 0:07:11.640 When the mother passes, she's twenty three, so there's nineteen 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:14.240 twenty four. Yeah right, so yeah, Flapper era total like, 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:16.360 you know, the it girl. Clara Bow is the thing, 0:07:16.440 --> 0:07:18.560 and she, by the way, is a pilot, so you 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:22.280 know this is in the air. Right. So she decides, 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:23.480 you know what, I'm gonna go out and keep me 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:25.080 some adventure. Now that I got some money, I don't 0:07:25.080 --> 0:07:28.160 need to work unless she goes to South America, takes 0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:31.000 a cruise down South America, has a ball, just enjoys 0:07:31.000 --> 0:07:33.680 herself all the heck. She gets back to America and 0:07:33.720 --> 0:07:36.000 she's like, you know what, forget this, I'm going back 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:37.680 to South America. But this time she's like, I'm gonna 0:07:37.680 --> 0:07:39.000 do things a little bit different. I want to have 0:07:39.440 --> 0:07:42.360 more adventure than I could last time. I'm ditching the dresses. 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:45.800 I'm gonna go and be, you know, dressed as a man. Huh. 0:07:45.840 --> 0:07:48.240 So this is how she earned her nickname Poncho. She 0:07:48.320 --> 0:07:50.960 goes back to South America and she rides on a 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:55.120 banana boat and she gets okay, dresses a man exactly. 0:07:55.320 --> 0:07:57.880 She books passed it down to banana boat. And uh, 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:00.240 while she's on banana boat, she discovers it. The true 0:08:00.240 --> 0:08:02.360 has this little secret that they did not tell her before. 0:08:02.400 --> 0:08:05.240 She said sale. Turns out they are smuggling guns to 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:08.600 the Mexican revolutionaries. Oh well, she gets caught up in 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:12.240 the Mexican Revolution. This is the Cristero Revolution, when you 0:08:12.320 --> 0:08:16.480 had warriors for Christ fighting against thee the Constitution nineteen 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:18.720 it must have been much safer for her to travel 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:23.440 in men's cloth completely. Yeah, you're right on with that, 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:26.480 I know I am. When she gets caught in her 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:29.400 men's clothes with all the other revolutionaries, Mexican officials, they 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.040 take the boat. The guns are seas. The revolutionaries are 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:34.680 in prison, which includes Poncho Barnes. So she gets locked 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:36.960 up as a revolutionary for about a month and a half. 0:08:37.080 --> 0:08:40.440 While she's inside, she bonds with this other American who 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:42.120 was on the boat as well. His name was Roger 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:44.800 Shoot and Rogers Shoot is the helmsman on the but 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:49.080 on a boat. No, he's a well off American, you know, 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:51.360 rich kid, and he's out there for quote the thrill 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:54.320 of it. Interesting. Yeah, he's a Stanford graduate. He's a 0:08:54.360 --> 0:08:57.040 marine biologist, studies fishery. So he's like a smart cat, 0:08:57.160 --> 0:08:59.760 you know, well to do footloose, fancy free, just like Poncho. 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:02.319 Two of them decide, you know, we need to escape 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:06.319 this Mexican prison. So they managed to steal a horse 0:09:06.360 --> 0:09:09.160 and a burrow and they take off on burrowback and 0:09:09.320 --> 0:09:12.120 horseball and they head for the American border. But then, 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:13.840 you know what, now that we're free and in Mexico, 0:09:13.880 --> 0:09:16.160 maybe we should kick around for a little bit. So 0:09:16.200 --> 0:09:18.280 they kick around Mexico. I figure you'd enjoy this. They're 0:09:18.280 --> 0:09:21.000 eating good food, enjoying all the sites, learning some Spanish. 0:09:21.000 --> 0:09:22.920 They decide, you know what, we should become lovers. So 0:09:23.320 --> 0:09:26.600 they become lovers. They spend seven months bouncing around Mexico. 0:09:27.040 --> 0:09:29.000 At one point they're like, we should probably get back 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:31.840 to America. So they're in Mexico City and they decide 0:09:31.880 --> 0:09:34.800 we'll walk down to Vera Cruz. So they walked down 0:09:34.840 --> 0:09:36.680 to Ericaus, which is on the Gulf Coast. For those 0:09:36.720 --> 0:09:38.920 who don't know, it's about a two hundred and fifty 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:41.720 mile overland walk. But they want a book passage. So 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:46.160 they're traversing the Mexican countryside. And at this point, she's 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:49.080 still known as Florence Leontine. So Flow is like, you know, 0:09:49.160 --> 0:09:51.360 making a joke about her lover Roger, and she's like, oh, 0:09:51.360 --> 0:09:55.120 you're hit like that windmill jousting hero don Quixote. And 0:09:55.200 --> 0:09:57.320 he laughs and he's well educated, so he's like, oh, 0:09:57.400 --> 0:10:00.640 then that makes you Poncho. She it's a moun props them. 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:04.960 She corrects them. She's like, don Quixote's sidekick was Sancho Panza. Yeah, 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:07.680 and he's like, ah, right, right. He's like, well, no matter, 0:10:07.800 --> 0:10:10.480 the nickname sticks. They start calling her Poncho, so she 0:10:10.640 --> 0:10:12.840 becomes Poncho for the rest of her life. That's a 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:15.560 great nickname, right, totally. Yeah, I mean it's it's not 0:10:15.640 --> 0:10:18.520 as good as Dizzy, but it's good. Uh, you see 0:10:18.559 --> 0:10:22.600 me looking away for the camera. So Florence Leontine Low 0:10:22.679 --> 0:10:26.319 is now Poncho Barnes, right, Poncho and Roger. They head 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:29.000 back to America and leave Mexico behind. They try to 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:31.160 go up to the Mississippi, like where the waters are 0:10:31.160 --> 0:10:33.720 coming out in New Orleans. They make it to New Orleans, 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:36.120 they get off the boat, and then they now have 0:10:36.160 --> 0:10:39.400 to cross America because they're both from California. So they hitchhike, 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:43.400 they train hop when there's no vehicle available, they walk. 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:47.880 They end up taking another huge trek seventeen hundred miles 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:50.600 from New Orleans to California. But these are like trust 0:10:50.600 --> 0:10:53.120 fund kids in totally, and they're gonna cross the Southwest, 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:55.080 which is no easy place. You miss that train, you're 0:10:55.080 --> 0:10:58.200 stuck in the Arizona desert, right, Yeah, So they're like managing, 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:01.319 right exactly. So on this they get back to California, 0:11:01.360 --> 0:11:03.240 and now the lover's part way, so they both you know, 0:11:03.400 --> 0:11:06.760 young and impetuous boom. Pancho settles into her life as 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:08.760 a rich girl in San Marino. She's got this cousin 0:11:08.840 --> 0:11:12.840 who's got this new hobby. She's taking flying lessons ponchos like, oh, 0:11:12.880 --> 0:11:15.280 I'll ride down with you. She sees the plane, she 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:17.800 sees the instructors, She's like, I gotta fly too, So 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:20.920 she hops in there instant pilot. She just takes to 0:11:21.000 --> 0:11:24.640 it immediately. So she's you know, she has like this 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:27.800 is biplane error right, So right, this is like you know, uh, 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:31.599 like when you're imagining like the leather sided, open cockpit, 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:35.080 double wings. So this is how she's flying now. These planes, 0:11:35.280 --> 0:11:37.000 least the one that she learned on, it had just 0:11:37.240 --> 0:11:39.800 one instrument, like didn't have an instrument panel like an 0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:42.600 on off switch. Basically, there was an oil gage to 0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:44.560 let her know how much oil the engine had. That 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:48.480 was that's it. That's the only girl. No fuel, no altimeter, 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:51.680 no spiedometer, no. So for the altimeter, what she had 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:53.559 was you look over the side of the cockpit. That's 0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:58.240 how high like a string they have that that's kidding. 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:00.240 That's how she knows how much a gas there is. 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:02.280 There is a string that you dip into the gas 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:05.360 and it's I could have built these early planes. If 0:12:05.400 --> 0:12:09.040 it's wet, there's fuel. If it's dry, try to land exactly, 0:12:10.000 --> 0:12:12.640 but also the the you know, there's like a horizon 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:14.679 gage in a plane. The horizon gage is just a 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:18.720 key chain tide. So if it's level, your level, if hey, 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:21.319 I want to look out the window. So that's how 0:12:21.360 --> 0:12:23.520 she learns to fly in this early flying machine. And 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:28.200 she absolutely like the long flowing scarf and the level completely, 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:31.800 the leather like like helmet, and then the goggles on top, 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:34.880 and then the white like flowing scarooy in the back 0:12:35.120 --> 0:12:38.200 and snoopy in woodstock both yes, you know it. I 0:12:38.280 --> 0:12:40.920 was there. So it took her only six hours before 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.200 she could fly solo for the first time. That's like 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:45.520 unheard of six hours. And she's like, I'm good to go. 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:49.400 She's like hey, hey, And so she earns her pilot's 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:52.959 license pretty quickly. She was so early in aviation history 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:57.400 that Orville Wright signed her pilot's license. No, No, that's 0:12:57.440 --> 0:13:00.679 like a joke, like exactly, like what you're doing the 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:05.199 dozens like your mom's So she got rrible right on exactly. 0:13:05.280 --> 0:13:07.800 So now she's a pilot, she's got horrible rights in 0:13:07.840 --> 0:13:10.320 premature on her license. She's like, I need a plane. 0:13:10.360 --> 0:13:12.280 So what does she do? Well, she's rich, so she 0:13:12.320 --> 0:13:14.480 goes and buys herself a nice biplane. She buys the 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:17.360 travel Air speed Wing, which is like a real cutting 0:13:17.440 --> 0:13:20.240 edge plane. Can people walk on the wing? Yeah? They could. Actually, 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:21.960 it's that type of plane. So this one was owned 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:24.680 by Howard Hawks, the film director of Screwball Comedies like 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:27.760 Bringing a Baby. Oh really okay, So it's like a 0:13:27.920 --> 0:13:29.520 you know, it's a well maintained plane, but it's still 0:13:29.520 --> 0:13:32.080 pretty experimental, right, So the first time she flies it, 0:13:32.280 --> 0:13:33.960 she sides, I don't want to fly it across country. 0:13:34.000 --> 0:13:36.480 So she tries flying it. The first time. She has 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:40.199 to set it down eight times for emergency landings, eight times, 0:13:42.360 --> 0:13:45.920 almost gonna tootle up to a pebble beach exactly. She's like, not, 0:13:46.040 --> 0:13:49.360 I'll make it up bouncing down again. So she's like, 0:13:49.400 --> 0:13:51.240 you know, pretty good at flying. None of this is 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:54.079 really terribly scary for her. So she starts competing in 0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:57.160 air races, and she starts doing barnstorming exhibitions. At one 0:13:57.200 --> 0:13:59.839 point she has Poncho Barnes's Mystery Circus of the Air. 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:04.000 Mystery Circus of the Air. That's flying spectacle, that's amazing. 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:07.200 She also has the her favorite sunt that she would 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:13.640 pull was called the surprise parachute. She would invite a 0:14:13.720 --> 0:14:16.240 member of the audience to take their first airplane flight. 0:14:16.320 --> 0:14:18.240 And because she's like, you know, she'd remember herself as 0:14:18.240 --> 0:14:19.800 a young girl, she'd usually pick a girl. Said she 0:14:19.880 --> 0:14:21.480 get a girl out on the plane. She strapped the 0:14:21.480 --> 0:14:23.680 girl into a parachute, so she's the kid would be safe. 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:26.000 She'd take them up in the biplane and once they 0:14:26.000 --> 0:14:27.880 are high enough that everyone can see them and the 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:30.400 people look tiny from the ground, she would toss the 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:33.320 child out of the plane. No, without telling the child, 0:14:33.360 --> 0:14:35.800 they're going to be taught out of the plane. Elizabeth, 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:40.720 wait and the total surprise is injected from the byplane 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:43.960 rang a parachute. The child plummets back to the air surprise. 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:46.640 The child doesn't know how to like yank the parachute 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:49.040 yard right, So they had like a string attached to 0:14:49.080 --> 0:14:51.600 the plane that would pull the rip cord from the plane. 0:14:51.720 --> 0:14:53.200 Oh my god. And it's like if that didn't work, 0:14:53.200 --> 0:14:55.120 I don't know what's gonna happen. It always worked, so 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:57.680 no kids were hurt, and the kid would parachute to Earth. 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:01.600 Now I'm not a parent, right, could you imagine someone 0:15:03.360 --> 0:15:06.840 Oh my god, so it was a different time. Yeah, yeah, 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:11.000 this is like far less lutitious exactly, which is interesting 0:15:11.040 --> 0:15:13.840 because later on her life she sued everybody. Well, yeah, sue, 0:15:13.880 --> 0:15:16.120 sue you exact, but like, how many times was her 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:19.400 life threatened by an angry father or mother? No reports 0:15:19.400 --> 0:15:21.160 to that that I could find, but I assume that 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:24.640 that I didn't make the papers. I don't know. Nineteen 0:15:24.680 --> 0:15:27.000 twenty nine, a couple years later, she's doing the powder 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:30.520 Puff Air Derby. This it's a race specifically for female 0:15:30.560 --> 0:15:32.960 pilots because there's a bunch now female pilots growing because 0:15:32.960 --> 0:15:36.440 Emilie aarhart Is is blowing everyone's mind. Flying is a 0:15:36.520 --> 0:15:40.480 gendered event exactly. So she's coming in for a landing 0:15:40.480 --> 0:15:42.520 at one point and the truck is trying to cross 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:45.560 the runway ahead of her planning and the driver misjudges 0:15:45.600 --> 0:15:48.120 the distance, doesn't realize how fast she's trying to come in. 0:15:48.440 --> 0:15:51.440 She nails the truck on the runway, totally walks away 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:53.480 on scathe, just like, yeah, well you know. It can 0:15:53.520 --> 0:15:55.680 reinded me of the film The Great Waldo Pepper, which 0:15:55.720 --> 0:15:58.000 is a Robert Redford film about the flying days, and 0:15:58.080 --> 0:15:59.960 he has a couple of crashes. I just kept picturing 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:02.240 her doing that. The plane's upside down in the grass. 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:09.920 She walks away like exactly lucky. So meanwhile, August first, 0:16:09.960 --> 0:16:12.960 nineteen thirty, she's flying in her new travel air type 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:15.920 our Mystery Ships, the new fastest plane that she can buy. 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:19.240 Mystery Ship. Yeah right, great name. So Ponto Barnes officially 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:23.160 becomes the fastest woman alive. Yes. Wow. She shatters Amelia 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:26.320 Earhart speed record and the record at the time she 0:16:26.360 --> 0:16:28.720 gets his one hundred and ninety six point one nine 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.400 miles an hour. Whoa yeah. So about the same time, 0:16:31.440 --> 0:16:34.400 she becomes friends with aviation Maverick Howard Hughes, friend of 0:16:34.400 --> 0:16:38.040 the show, right, and Hughes was designing aircraft like unlike 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:40.000 anyone else, but she's doing this in like an air 0:16:40.080 --> 0:16:44.200 GLOPPI well, at this point she's buying nicer and nicer place. No, no, 0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:47.120 nothing like that. These are all like propeller planes were 0:16:47.520 --> 0:16:51.360 nineteen thirty, So you can't even really fly. It's an 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:56.320 air gloppy with a big ratchette spinning. She and Howard 0:16:56.360 --> 0:16:58.480 Hughes have the same love of speed, so he hires 0:16:58.520 --> 0:17:01.680 her to fly in his movie Be the Hell's Angels. Right, Okay. 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:04.800 That so she becomes a stunt pilot in Hollywood, and 0:17:04.840 --> 0:17:07.600 then she starts a union for pilots called the Associated 0:17:07.640 --> 0:17:10.080 Motion Picture Pilots, And this is one of the first 0:17:10.200 --> 0:17:12.720 unions in Hollywood. So you can probably now start to 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.560 see why she's a personal heroine, total badass, right, okay, 0:17:16.560 --> 0:17:18.160 So let's take a quick break and then I'll get 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:20.800 back into how Poncho Barnes got into a fight with 0:17:20.840 --> 0:17:45.920 the US Air Force and became friends with Chuck Yeager. Now, Elizabeth, yes, sar, 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:48.480 we're back. Oh we are, Yeah, that's us cool. Now. 0:17:48.520 --> 0:17:50.600 You may have noticed when I was talking before that 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:52.960 we were bouncing around in the early days of aviation. Yes, 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:55.359 I noticed that. I thought, you once, you're pretty quick, 0:17:55.960 --> 0:17:58.520 and you you've heard some iconic names, Howard Hughes, a 0:17:58.560 --> 0:18:02.360 millionaire heart. So we are kind of sidestepping the fact 0:18:02.400 --> 0:18:05.280 that in nineteen thirty there is another major social trend 0:18:05.320 --> 0:18:09.399 other than aviation shaping lives nineteen thirty. Yeah, the Great Depression. Yeah, 0:18:09.480 --> 0:18:11.880 so yeah, exactly, the Great In nineteen twenty nine stock 0:18:11.880 --> 0:18:15.119 market crash and kicks off the Great Depression. Pancho Barns 0:18:15.119 --> 0:18:18.040 and Heiress, you'd think Oh, she's somewhat buffeted from all 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:20.760 of the undulations of the stock market. But she isn't 0:18:20.800 --> 0:18:22.879 immune to the Great Depression. Pretty much, no one was 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.919 unless they're super wealthy. So in early nineteen thirties, she 0:18:25.920 --> 0:18:28.040 has to rent out her family estate in San Marino. 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:29.960 Later on, this is the family home she grew up 0:18:30.000 --> 0:18:32.159 in where she had horses that she ride in Tijuana. Right, 0:18:32.200 --> 0:18:35.440 So the depression drags on. She then has to sell 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:38.719 the family estate. She leaves her life in Hollywood behind, 0:18:38.880 --> 0:18:41.760 and she leaves all of her hard partying, high flying days, 0:18:41.760 --> 0:18:44.480 and she moves out to the desert. Huh. She buys 0:18:44.480 --> 0:18:47.320 herself a four room ranch house. It's located in a 0:18:47.400 --> 0:18:51.960 super rural area known as the Antelope Valley to Antelope 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:54.080 Valley Okay, yeah, yeah, high desert if you take the 0:18:54.119 --> 0:18:56.840 five out of La Yeah. Okay, So it's east of 0:18:56.960 --> 0:18:59.080 La it's in the mountains. It's on this high desert plain. 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:01.399 And she buys this, and surrounding her is this one 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:05.120 hundred and eighty acre alfalfa farm. And meanwhile her neighbors 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:08.520 are this place called Muroc Dry Lake. Murroc Dry Lake. 0:19:08.520 --> 0:19:10.879 It's a huge expanse of land unsuitable for farming or 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:13.560 anything else. It's pretty much just a dry riverbed, all dusty, 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:15.760 brooke and earth. But it's the home of the young 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:18.200 Army Air Corps. They use the dry lake to as 0:19:18.200 --> 0:19:21.480 a testing ground for plane pilots. Yeah, the training camp 0:19:21.560 --> 0:19:23.840 would one day grow and spread and become Edwards Air 0:19:23.840 --> 0:19:27.359 Force Base. No way, Okay, it starts back then. Yeah, 0:19:27.359 --> 0:19:31.120 that was putting the map in my head right now, right, 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:34.520 So Ponto Barn she's sets up shop next to Murroc 0:19:34.640 --> 0:19:38.199 Dry Lake Training Camp. Being a pilot aviation pioneer herself, 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:40.920 she becomes fast friends with all the pilots and officers. 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:43.000 Soon enough she's like opened it up her place for 0:19:43.080 --> 0:19:45.200 pilots to come and drink and eat and relax. There's 0:19:45.200 --> 0:19:47.200 not really plenty places to go, and they're all really 0:19:47.280 --> 0:19:50.800 enjoying the wildflowers in the spring, which is Antelope Valley 0:19:50.960 --> 0:19:54.840 super booms. Yes, So the government signs contracts with her 0:19:54.880 --> 0:19:56.879 and they have her supply the Army Air car with 0:19:57.119 --> 0:19:59.920 not only pilots and planes that she recommends and instructor 0:20:00.160 --> 0:20:02.320 that she knows, but also to sell them hog meat 0:20:02.359 --> 0:20:04.920 and milk. So she gets the trash from the base 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:06.639 she feeds it to the pigs and then sells the 0:20:06.640 --> 0:20:08.399 pigs back to the base. Hey, it's the circle of 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:11.440 lights exactly. So by the end of the decade the depression, 0:20:11.680 --> 0:20:14.200 it's nineteen thirty nine. Ponto Barnes has created quite a 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:16.400 spread for herself. She's managed her way through the depression. 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:19.359 She's now named the place Rancho autroo Verde, which, for 0:20:19.359 --> 0:20:22.120 those who don't speak Spanish means green gold ranch. So 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:25.119 World War two probably a reference to the poppies and 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:30.000 the wildfli exactly, and the alfalfa. Well. World War two 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:32.480 kicks off in nineteen thirty nine. Two years later, the 0:20:32.520 --> 0:20:35.800 US enters the fight after Pearl Harbor. Poncho Barnes's business 0:20:35.920 --> 0:20:38.760 is now a booming as the military ramps up its operations. 0:20:39.600 --> 0:20:42.280 That same year, in nineteen forty one, Ponto Barnes enlarges 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:44.639 her ranch. So now she adds a swimming pool. She 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:46.920 adds a fish pond that shaped like the new Air 0:20:46.920 --> 0:20:48.920 Force emblem, because the Air Force is now the US 0:20:49.240 --> 0:20:51.760 the Army Air Force, so they become the Air Force 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:53.840 on their own. Because she makes it like that laurel 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:55.439 wreath that they have, She's like, oh, I'll make a 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:58.560 pool like that. Yes, so she also she creates a 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:02.560 private hangar plane for fan totally. She's like people who 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:06.760