Speaker 1: Welcomed. Aaron Manky's Cabinet of Curiosity is 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 right there on display, just
Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
Speaker 1: Some of the best legendary figures from history are the
Speaker 1: ones shrouded in mystery. Where they came from and what
Speaker 1: their upbringing was like always seems to make them more
Speaker 1: human than myth, which makes us unable to fill in
Speaker 1: the gaps with our own embellished details. But little is
Speaker 1: known about Vincent de Groof. Some say that he was Dutch,
Speaker 1: others Belgian. He was born around eighteen thirty eight and
Speaker 1: once we're as a shoemaker, but his ambitions took him
Speaker 1: much higher. Literally. Vincent fancied himself something of an aeronaut
Speaker 1: at the time when many were exploring the skies. In
Speaker 1: the mid to late eighteen hundreds, aeronauts like Henry Coxwell
Speaker 1: and James Glacier were setting records and making advances in
Speaker 1: the field of flight, specifically with hot air balloons. In
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty two. For example, Glacier and Coxwell reached an
Speaker 1: altitude between twenty nine thousand and thirty five thousand feet
Speaker 1: in a balloon with a ninety three thousand cubic foot capacity,
Speaker 1: the largest such vessel built up to that point. Vincent
Speaker 1: wanted to make a name for himself like Coxwell and Glacier,
Speaker 1: but hot air balloon was only part of the plan.
Speaker 1: He'd also built a contraption like something out of one
Speaker 1: of those Leonardo da Vinci notebooks. It was an ornithopter
Speaker 1: comprised of a pair of silk wings and a silk
Speaker 1: covered tail, all of which was operated by a series
Speaker 1: of levers that he pulled while strapped into the device.
Speaker 1: Vincent had given all the details of his ornithopter and
Speaker 1: his historic flight to The Morning Post, an English newspaper,
Speaker 1: which published everything with the following disclaimer, the attempt will
Speaker 1: not be more dangerous than the descent of a parachute,
Speaker 1: if only they had known. On Sunday, June eighteen seventy three,
Speaker 1: over one thousand people gathered in Brussels to watch Vincent
Speaker 1: take his creation on its maiden voyage. He had organized
Speaker 1: the events on the grounds of a local military Academy,
Speaker 1: which had only been allowed because the lieutenant at the
Speaker 1: school had insisted on inspecting the flying machine beforehand. Vincent
Speaker 1: wasn't worried, though. In fact, he was so sure his
Speaker 1: ornithopter would fly that he had a program printed and
Speaker 1: handed out to the crowd that described how the whole
Speaker 1: spectacle would go down. First, he would flap the wings
Speaker 1: to propel himself upward and fly over the spectator's heads. Then,
Speaker 1: once they were properly amazed, he would be lifted by
Speaker 1: a hot air balloon high into the sky. Once he
Speaker 1: was at the proper altitude, he would cut himself loose
Speaker 1: and soar through the skies in his homemade rig. Vincent's
Speaker 1: was nothing if not ambitious, even when reality did its
Speaker 1: best to keep him grounded. When the event finally started
Speaker 1: two hours after its scheduled start time, by the way,
Speaker 1: he was only able to elevate himself a few feet
Speaker 1: off the ground, after which he faced planted into the
Speaker 1: dirt and damaged part of the ornithopter. Still, the minor
Speaker 1: setback didn't dampen his stubbornness to succeed. He simply carried
Speaker 1: on with the show, tying himself to the hot air
Speaker 1: balloon with a rope and allowing it to hoist him
Speaker 1: barely a few inches into the air. The rope you
Speaker 1: see snapped and Vincent once again came crashing back to earth.
Speaker 1: The crowds were more than a little upset. They shredded
Speaker 1: his balloon in protest, and many an attendance were arrested
Speaker 1: for rioting. It took a full year before Vincent made
Speaker 1: another earnest attempt at flight. He chose London as the
Speaker 1: venue and brought a brand new flying machine with him,
Speaker 1: one that bore a striking resemblance to a giant bat.
Speaker 1: Its wings measured around thirty five ft long and were
Speaker 1: made of silk, just like the last one. He tried
Speaker 1: it total of three times to achieve the kind of
Speaker 1: flight that he dreamed of. His first attempt, on June
Speaker 1: twenty nine, eighteen seventy four, saw him going up about
Speaker 1: four feet with the help of the hot air balloon.
Speaker 1: He was supposed to cut himself loose, but was still
Speaker 1: attached to the balloon when the whole apparatus caught in
Speaker 1: a tree. The second launch, on July seven was scrubbed
Speaker 1: due to high winds. Two days later, Vincent made his
Speaker 1: third and final attempt. Taking off from Cromorne Gardens and Chelsea,
Speaker 1: he hooked himself into his bat like horne thopter while
Speaker 1: the balloon it was tied to, rose above the city. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: there was an error in communication due to Vincent and
Speaker 1: the hot air balloon operators speaking different languages. Vincent tried
Speaker 1: to warn him that he was headed straight for St.
Speaker 1: Luke's Church and its soaring tower. Someone on the ground
Speaker 1: shouted at the men, who prompted Vincent to cut the
Speaker 1: ornathopter free and coast to safety. The balloon operator, however,
Speaker 1: realized that he was about to crash into the church
Speaker 1: and tossed out three bags of ballast to gain altitude.
Speaker 1: Those bags landed directly on since contraption, The wings collapsed,
Speaker 1: and its pilot plummeted to the street below. Thirty five
Speaker 1: year old Vincent de Groff died on July nine, eight
Speaker 1: seventy four. Very little was known about who he was
Speaker 1: or where he had come from, but he became something
Speaker 1: of a legend, dying while doing what he loved, even
Speaker 1: if his efforts did sort of fall flat. During the
Speaker 1: Great Depression, Americans converged on movie theaters to get out
Speaker 1: of their heads. For a while, Hollywood hit its golden
Speaker 1: age and people wanted to be amused, so for the
Speaker 1: price of a quarter per show, they could have a
Speaker 1: special treat and be delighted or scared by the films
Speaker 1: that we considered classics today, like Frankenstein, Dracula, or The Mummy.
Speaker 1: No one can resist a good scare. America already had
Speaker 1: a deep fascination with the great beyond thanks to the
Speaker 1: influence of spiritualism in the late nineteenth and early twenty centuries. Clairvoyance, mystics, mediums,
Speaker 1: and psychics all promised to fill americans deep seated need
Speaker 1: to contact their loved ones. On the other side, some
Speaker 1: were true believers, others were quacks, and many were downright criminal,
Speaker 1: but they all fan the flames of America's enthusiasm for
Speaker 1: the supernatural and with being scared out of their wits
Speaker 1: as well. But as people moved from the seance table
Speaker 1: to the theater seats, theater owners discovered that it wasn't
Speaker 1: just horror films that were packing in the crowds. It
Speaker 1: was the midnight ghost shows that had become a sensation.
Speaker 1: Ghost shows, also called spook shows or monster shows, were
Speaker 1: a combination of something very old and very new. At
Speaker 1: these performances, audiences could expect a night of creepy stunts
Speaker 1: and special effects that seemed supernatural, in addition to psychic
Speaker 1: readings and other magical acts. One of the earliest examples
Speaker 1: dates back to France in seventeen ninety eight, when a
Speaker 1: Belgian named Etienne Gaspard Robertson used a magic lantern to
Speaker 1: project images that seemed to move right before viewers eyes,
Speaker 1: nearly one hundred years before the motion picture camera was invented.
Speaker 1: But it was someone else, a guy named Elwyn Charles Peck,
Speaker 1: who was considered the father of the midnight ghost show.
Speaker 1: Sometime around nineteen nine, he created an act that he
Speaker 1: called Elwyn's Midnight Spook Party and drew on the tricks
Speaker 1: and illusions of his spiritualist predecessors. Teenagers loved the ghost shows,
Speaker 1: and whenever they saw advertisements for the performance pop up
Speaker 1: in town, they cheerfully trooped off to the movie theater
Speaker 1: to hopefully get their pants scared off of them. Onlookers
Speaker 1: were lured in with the promise of a good scare
Speaker 1: and shamed if they didn't take the bait. Girls were
Speaker 1: encouraged to bring their new boyfriends to see if they
Speaker 1: were courageous or cowardly. Most went together in groups called
Speaker 1: a spook party to better protect themselves. When the ghosts
Speaker 1: swept into the audience or people were pulled onto the stage,
Speaker 1: patrons shuffled into theaters, talking and laughing nervously as they
Speaker 1: found their seats. When the show would start, the house
Speaker 1: lights with dim The host emerged, usually dressed in a
Speaker 1: costume that wouldn't look out of place in a psychic's
Speaker 1: gothic parlor. He would talk for a few minutes, priming
Speaker 1: the audience for the performance, and then he would step
Speaker 1: aside and introduce the rest of the act. The entire
Speaker 1: performance consisted of magic tricks, illusions, conjuring, and audience participation,
Speaker 1: and lasted about forty five minutes, followed by the inevitable
Speaker 1: yet sudden blackout at the end. By the end of
Speaker 1: the nineteen thirties, these blackouts heralded the start of a
Speaker 1: horror film that would become a staple of the whole escapade.
Speaker 1: If you went to a ghost show at a drive
Speaker 1: in theater, you might look out your car window to
Speaker 1: see masked and costumed ghosts monsters and demons scuttling between
Speaker 1: the cars, popping up randomly to make unsuspecting audience members
Speaker 1: jump in their seats. Unfortunately, World War Two put a
Speaker 1: halt to Elwyn and the other ghost shows that had
Speaker 1: begun touring during the depression. Though people still frequently went
Speaker 1: to the movies, many teenagers and young men who participated
Speaker 1: in these acts went overseas to fight. Some assumed the
Speaker 1: horrors of war would drive people away from the horror
Speaker 1: genre altogether once they returned from Europe and the Pacific,
Speaker 1: but a funny thing happened instead. Horror film popularity exploded.
Speaker 1: Films like Frankenstein and Dracula were re released and sequels
Speaker 1: were produced as audiences embraced the terror with new Augusto.
Speaker 1: Ghost shows found new life in the post World War two.
Speaker 1: Raymond Really Raymond Corbin operated the Zombie Jamboree, which toured
Speaker 1: from nineteen forty three to nineteen fifty three. In his shows,
Speaker 1: Blood and Guts flew as a mad doctor operated on
Speaker 1: a kicking and screaming patient. The terrifying scene ended spectacularly
Speaker 1: when a cast member waving a bone saw, ran into
Speaker 1: the crowd to chop off an audience member's head all
Speaker 1: magic tricks. Of course, ghost shows made decent money too.
Speaker 1: Some troops pulled in almost four thousand dollars per night
Speaker 1: in larger theaters, more than sixty dollars today. Through the
Speaker 1: late nineteen forties and fifties, it seemed like the ghost
Speaker 1: shows were writing the high that would never end. I mean,
Speaker 1: everyone loves a good scare right well, just like video
Speaker 1: killed the radio star, it almost killed the ghost show too.
Speaker 1: As television became more popular, and as the gimmicks ghost
Speaker 1: shows relied on became less believable, people stopped going. A
Speaker 1: mysterious rapping sound and glow in the dark paint weren't
Speaker 1: enough anymore. Slowly, troops disbanded and ghost shows disappeared, giving
Speaker 1: way to a new horror experience. Still, the spectacle and
Speaker 1: costumes became hugely influential on other stage shows, like the
Speaker 1: rock and Roll Acts of Alice Cooper and Kiss. We
Speaker 1: probably won't see the return of the Ghost show, but
Speaker 1: who knows. Trends are cyclical after all, and there's always
Speaker 1: the chance we'll see people flocked to the theater once
Speaker 1: again for a good old fashion phantomime. 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 Manky 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.