WEBVTT - Why Was the Mad Hatter Mad? 0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio, 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:09.800 Hey brain Stuff, Lauren bog Obam here. If you've read 0:00:09.840 --> 0:00:13.080 Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland or seeing any of 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:16.320 the movie adaptations, the character of the mad Hatter is 0:00:16.360 --> 0:00:19.680 bound to have left an impression. He's eccentric, to say 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:22.720 the least, as he presides over a rollicking tea party 0:00:22.760 --> 0:00:26.960 that Alice attends. But the idea of being mad as 0:00:27.000 --> 0:00:30.840 a hatter in the British sense mad meaning crazy, not angry, 0:00:31.160 --> 0:00:35.239 it didn't come from Carol, And if you, like Alice, 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:38.600 have a tendency to fall down rabbit holes, this phrase 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:42.560 is an interesting one. Carol's book was published in eighteen 0:00:42.600 --> 0:00:45.879 sixty five, but the Oxford English Dictionary puts the earliest 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:48.800 known use of mad as a hatter in eighty nine. 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:51.560 That's three and a half decades before any march Hares 0:00:51.640 --> 0:00:54.680 or Dormice sipped tea or the cheshire Cat made his 0:00:54.760 --> 0:00:58.480 famous claim of the general madness of the inhabitants of Wonderland. 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:02.840 We're all mad here. The actual origin of the phrase 0:01:02.880 --> 0:01:05.520 mad as a hatter is unknown, but it's believed to 0:01:05.560 --> 0:01:09.839 be connected to mercury poisoning in hat Makers. Several years 0:01:09.880 --> 0:01:14.120 after Alice's Hatter first appeared in three, the phrase hatters 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:17.800 shakes was used to describe the condition caused by mercury poisoning. 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:22.160 The symptoms included muscle tremors and mental and behavioral changes. 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:26.360 Wonderland's Hatter behaves strangely in the novel, as do most 0:01:26.400 --> 0:01:29.000 of the characters, but his friends seemed to accept his 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:34.080 oddities as being normal. Today, mercury poisoning is known to 0:01:34.160 --> 0:01:38.120 the medical and scientific communities as aritism. The modern list 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:41.480 of symptoms includes irritability and mania, both of which the 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:46.520 hatter displays, but there's also sleep disturbance, depression, visual disturbance, 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:50.880 hearing loss, and those tell tale tremors, at least the bladder, 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:53.240 of which the Hatter does not seem to have, though 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:56.880 to be fair, he only appears briefly. You may be 0:01:56.960 --> 0:01:59.760 glad to learn that although short term exposure to mercury 0:01:59.800 --> 0:02:03.080 can cause earism, it usually goes away if you can 0:02:03.120 --> 0:02:07.480 avoid further contact with mercury. Long term exposures such as 0:02:07.520 --> 0:02:11.080 that that dental professionals and chemical workers experience, can mean 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:15.560 the symptoms persist. In any case, Aritism is a rare disease. 0:02:17.160 --> 0:02:20.040 After the tea party, during the playing card court trial 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.480 to determine who has stolen the tarts, the hatter explains 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:25.400 to the king that he has no hats of his 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:28.200 own because he sells all of the hats he has, 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:31.239 which brings us to the last stop in our rabbit hole. 0:02:31.760 --> 0:02:35.600 What does mercury have to do with hats? It was 0:02:35.680 --> 0:02:39.760 part of a process called carroting. In order to make felt, 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:41.960 which is what many hats are made of, you have 0:02:42.080 --> 0:02:44.280 to get the fur of a beaver or rabbit to 0:02:44.639 --> 0:02:48.760 stick together in a matte of thick, stiff fabric, which 0:02:48.800 --> 0:02:51.080 means you have to get the fur off of the skin. 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:54.600 To get the fur off of the skin cleanly, mercuric 0:02:54.760 --> 0:02:57.799 nitrate was used. It came to be known as carroting 0:02:57.919 --> 0:03:00.360 because the solution would turn the edges of the pelt 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:05.760 orange as it dried. Modern haberdashers use hydrogen peroxide to 0:03:05.760 --> 0:03:07.919 remove the fur from the skin, which is a slower 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:13.560 but much safer process. But apparently Louis Carol didn't mean 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:17.639 to slander hatters via his tea party host of First 0:03:17.840 --> 0:03:20.760 The phrase mad hatter never appears in the book. He's 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:24.120 merely called the Hatter. It's the other characters, like Alice 0:03:24.120 --> 0:03:27.600 and the cheshire Cat who consider him mad. Second Carol 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:30.040 once responded to a query about the word play in 0:03:30.080 --> 0:03:32.760 this his most famous work by saying, I'm very much 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:41.440 afraid I didn't mean anything but nonsense. Today's episode was 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:44.080 written by Kristen hall Geisler and produced by Tyler Clang. 0:03:44.400 --> 0:03:46.440 For more on this and lots of other Curiouser and 0:03:46.600 --> 0:03:50.160 Curiouser topics, visit how stuffworks dot com. Brain Stuff is 0:03:50.200 --> 0:03:52.480 production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my 0:03:52.520 --> 0:03:55.400 heart Radio, visit the heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or 0:03:55.400 --> 0:03:57.040 wherever you listen to your favorite shows.