Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Benky's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Our bodies can play strange tricks on us sometimes.
Speaker 1: For example, since the advent of the cell phone, a
Speaker 1: phenomenon known as phantom vibration syndrome has plagued users with
Speaker 1: the sensation that their phones are buzzing in their pockets
Speaker 1: when they're not. And In the study performed by German
Speaker 1: scientists at University of Bremen, subjects were asked to perform
Speaker 1: various tasks like shuffling cards or shaking a bottle of liquid.
Speaker 1: They were then shown videos of other people doing the
Speaker 1: same tasks, as well as others that they hadn't performed.
Speaker 1: Two weeks later, the researchers asked the volunteers to remember
Speaker 1: which tasks they had completed. Most replied that they had
Speaker 1: done the actions performed on camera, even though they hadn't
Speaker 1: actually finished them personally, their brains had been implanted with
Speaker 1: false memories. But there's a sensation that affects a small
Speaker 1: subset of people all over the world and from all backgrounds.
Speaker 1: Imagine phantom vibration syndrome, but only on a larger scale.
Speaker 1: And it doesn't just make you think your phone is buzzing.
Speaker 1: It makes the whole room vibrate. It's called the hum phenomenon.
Speaker 1: Now sometimes it's named after the place where it's found.
Speaker 1: In New Mexico, for example, it's known as the Taos Hum.
Speaker 1: In Sydney, Australia, they call it the Bondi hum. Locals
Speaker 1: to those areas described the sound as everything from a
Speaker 1: diesel truck engine idling in the background to a high
Speaker 1: pitched wine. It isn't heard by everyone, only a small
Speaker 1: group of individuals, but to those people it can be maddening.
Speaker 1: The Taos hum, for example, was first reported in the
Speaker 1: early nineteen nineties based on a survey of people in
Speaker 1: the area taken at the time. Only about two percent
Speaker 1: of the population could actually hear it. What made things
Speaker 1: stranger was that the hum could not be detected on
Speaker 1: any scientific equipment. Readings taken in the homes of those
Speaker 1: afflicted didn't pick anything out of the ordinary up and
Speaker 1: not everyone heard the same humming sound. It varied in
Speaker 1: pitch and frequency from person to person. As a result
Speaker 1: of these incessant hums and buzzes, the affected people stay
Speaker 1: awake at night and developed mental illnesses such as anxiety.
Speaker 1: One person even took their own life because they couldn't
Speaker 1: get the humming to stop. Experts have tried to provide
Speaker 1: reasons for these phenomena. For example, the residents of a
Speaker 1: town in Indiana had been plagued by two separate hums.
Speaker 1: It was eventually discovered that one had come from a
Speaker 1: car manufacturing plant, while the other had originated at a
Speaker 1: local airport. The hum on a Hawaiian island, for example,
Speaker 1: was caused by active volcanoes. Taos, New Mexico, however, didn't
Speaker 1: have a factory or a volcano to blame it's hum on.
Speaker 1: The people affected by the sound, known as hearers, asked
Speaker 1: Congress to look into the cause, though no answer was
Speaker 1: officially given. It was believed that the buzzing they'd been
Speaker 1: hearing had been coming from a Navy communication system broadcasting
Speaker 1: at a special frequency just for submarines. According to one professor,
Speaker 1: it was possible that the hum phenomenon might have been
Speaker 1: caused by liquids and gases making their way from deep
Speaker 1: inside the earth to the surface. It was also theorized
Speaker 1: that the hearers created the sounds themselves, not that they
Speaker 1: were faking it, but that in times of extreme silence,
Speaker 1: their ears had created something called spontaneous auto acoustic emissions
Speaker 1: as a way to compensate for the lack of background noise.
Speaker 1: And in a few cases, the humming had been caused
Speaker 1: by a fish. A fishy story, i know, but a
Speaker 1: creature known as the midshipman fish or the toadfish, had
Speaker 1: a very distinct mating call. It was responsible for causing
Speaker 1: houseboat residents to lose sleep, and the vibrations were so
Speaker 1: resonant that they could be heard through the hulls of
Speaker 1: the boats. The hum isn't just one sound in one city.
Speaker 1: It's comprised of many sounds across the globe. Sometimes it
Speaker 1: can be explained away as machines working or the movement
Speaker 1: of wind across various surfaces. Other times, however, the hum
Speaker 1: is a mystery, never ending enigma, plaguing a small slice
Speaker 1: of the population just trying to get a little shut
Speaker 1: eye with no way to pinpoint its origin, the hearers
Speaker 1: living in those areas are left with just two choices.
Speaker 1: Get used to it or buy some ear plugs. When
Speaker 1: it comes to cultural icons, sir and characters come to
Speaker 1: mind above all others. A particular cartoon mouse or a
Speaker 1: red headed plumber are both instantly recognizable, thanks mostly to
Speaker 1: how they imprinted on us as children. Walt Disney's most
Speaker 1: famous creation, that mouse, starting countless cartoons and movies over
Speaker 1: the years. After staring at the screen on a Saturday morning,
Speaker 1: we might have gone to bed with a stuffed version
Speaker 1: of the Squeaky Voice rodent nestled under our chins as
Speaker 1: we dozed off to sleep. The Nintendo Company's mustachioed Man
Speaker 1: of Action was in arcades, on our TVs, on lunch boxes,
Speaker 1: and so much more from the nineteen eighties onward, and
Speaker 1: his popularity shows no signs of slowing down today. But
Speaker 1: one such icon has survived even longer. His signature look
Speaker 1: is recognizable all over the world due in large part
Speaker 1: to the work of just one man. That man was
Speaker 1: Thomas and he was born in Germany in eighteen forty.
Speaker 1: His father was a member of the Bavarian military, but
Speaker 1: due to his contrary political leanings, he was forced to
Speaker 1: flee with his family in New York City. Now, Thomas
Speaker 1: wasn't much of an academic. His grades lacked, but he
Speaker 1: had a talent for art, specifically drawing. After attending school
Speaker 1: until the age of fourteen, he studied with a few
Speaker 1: popular artists the day, and even enrolled at the National
Speaker 1: Academy of Design, who would count among its members Jasper
Speaker 1: John's and Norman Rockwell. Thomas found his calling, however, once
Speaker 1: he turned eighteen and began working for the local news outlets.
Speaker 1: Harper's Weekly, a popular political magazine at the time, was
Speaker 1: the first to publish his cartoons and drawings. Thomas's style
Speaker 1: started out complex, with so much going on in his
Speaker 1: images that they required the reader to examine them multiple
Speaker 1: times in order to catch everything. As he got older,
Speaker 1: he simplified his techniques, opting for cartoons that were more
Speaker 1: direct to their message, but just as artistic in their delivery.
Speaker 1: One particular cartoon, however, published in eighteen seventy four, would
Speaker 1: cement Thomas as one of the most important artists in
Speaker 1: American history. A cartoon was titled the Third Term Panic.
Speaker 1: It was drawn in protest of the New York Herald's
Speaker 1: derisive reaction to the idea that Ulysses says Grant might
Speaker 1: run for a third presidential term. In the cartoon, he
Speaker 1: depicted news outlets and interest groups as various animals stampeding
Speaker 1: away from an elephant at the edge of a chasm.
Speaker 1: Imprinted on the side of the massive beast were the
Speaker 1: words the Republican Vote. Thomas went on to use the
Speaker 1: elephant to depict the Republican Party in several cartoons after that,
Speaker 1: a connotation that ended up sticking for good after other
Speaker 1: cartoonists did the same. But Thomas's political animals weren't his
Speaker 1: only influence on American culture. The Civil War had brought
Speaker 1: with it an opportunity to put a new spin on
Speaker 1: a beloved character, one who had become the Union's greatest
Speaker 1: recruiting tool. On the cover of the January third, eighteen
Speaker 1: sixty three issue of Harper's Weekly, this artist published an
Speaker 1: illustration of a large bearded man wearing clothes reminiscent of
Speaker 1: the American flag. In the drawing, the man held between
Speaker 1: his hands a puppet named Jeff with strings around its neck,
Speaker 1: a mocking representation of Confederate leader Jefferson Davis. Surrounding this
Speaker 1: figure were Union soldiers holding packages in their arms, and
Speaker 1: as the war went on, this character made more and
Speaker 1: more appearances in Thomas's cartoons. In later years, he was
Speaker 1: depicted as heavier, often with a long, thin pipe in
Speaker 1: his hands. He became more jovial, as evidenced by his
Speaker 1: reddened cheeks, a rosy nose, and a childlike smile. Eventually,
Speaker 1: the character, who had been living in New York was
Speaker 1: moved north way north. Other artists and companies eventually incorporated
Speaker 1: Thomas's character into their own products. Printer and publisher Lewis
Speaker 1: Praying put him on several greeting cards, wearing a large
Speaker 1: coat and carrying an overflowing sack full of toys, and
Speaker 1: in the Coca Cola company hired an illustrator to recreate
Speaker 1: Thomas's bearded man as a red suited elf with a
Speaker 1: large belly who lived at the North Pole in doing.
Speaker 1: Coca Cola may well have brought Thomas's creation to mainstream
Speaker 1: audiences thanks Stuart's impressive team of marketers, But it was
Speaker 1: Thomas Nast the man who had turned democrats into donkeys
Speaker 1: and Republicans into elephants. Who had given the most important
Speaker 1: makeover in history to one of the most beloved characters
Speaker 1: of all time, an invention that's influenced how the character
Speaker 1: has been depicted for the last one fifty years. Thanks
Speaker 1: to Thomas Nast, children everywhere now stay up late on
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve to catch a glimpse of Santa Claus. I
Speaker 1: hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities.
Speaker 1: Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about
Speaker 1: the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show
Speaker 1: was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore,
Speaker 1: which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and
Speaker 1: you to learn all about it over at the World
Speaker 1: of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.
Speaker 1: Yeah h