Futility Closet

When Toronto attorney Charles Vance Millar died in 1926, he left behind a mischievous will that promised a fortune to the woman who gave birth to the most children in the next 10 years. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow the Great Stork Derby and the hope and controversy it brought to Toronto's largest families during the Great Depression. We'll also visit some Portuguese bats and puzzle over a suspicious work crew. Intro: The programming language Shakespeare produces code that reads like a stage play. In a qualification round for the 1994 Caribbean Cup, Barbados and Grenada seemed to switch sides. Sources for our feature on the Great Stork Derby: Mark M. Orkin, The Great Stork Derby, 1982. In Re Estate of Charles Millar (1937), [1938] 1 D.L.R. 65 (Supreme Court of Canada). Chris Bateman, "Historicist: The Great Stork Derby," Torontoist, Oct. 29, 2016. David Goldenberg, "How a Dead Millionaire Convinced Dozens of Women to Have as Many Babies as Possible," Five Thirty Eight,

Lyudmila Pavlichenko was training for a career as a history teacher when Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941. She suspended her studies to enlist as a sniper in the Red Army, where she discovered a remarkable talent for shooting enemy soldiers. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll trace the career of "Lady Death," the deadliest female sniper in history. We'll also learn where in the world futility.closet.podcast is and puzzle over Air Force One. Intro: Andy Warhol's Brillo Boxes creates a host of puzzles in the philosophy of art. German architect Herman Sörgel wanted to dam the Congo to create two African seas. Sources for our feature on Lyudmila Pavlichenko: Lyudmila Pavlichenko, Lady Death: The Memoirs of Stalin's Sniper, 2018. Roger Reese, "Soviet Women at War," Military History 28:1 (May 2011), 44-53,5. Drew Lindsay, "Why Not Send Women to War?" MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History 25:3 (Spring 2013), 50-55, 58-61. Karl E. Friedl, "Biases of the Incumbents: What If W

Denis Vrain-Lucas was an undistinguished forger until he met gullible collector Michel Chasles. Through the 1860s Lucas sold Chasles thousands of phony letters by everyone from Plato to Louis the 14th, earning thousands of francs and touching off a firestorm among confused scholars. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll trace the career of the world's most prolific forger. We'll also count Queen Elizabeth's eggs and puzzle over a destroyed car. Intro: In 2011 Australian architect Horst Kiechle sculpted a human torso from paper. English historian Thomas Birch went angling dressed as a tree. Sources for our feature on Denis Vrain-Lucas: Joseph Rosenblum, Prince of Forgers, 1998. Michael Farquhar, A Treasury of Deception, 2005. John Whitehead, This Solemn Mockery, 1973. James Anson Farrer, Literary Forgeries, 1907. Rebekah Higgitt, "'Newton Dépossédé!' The British Response to the Pascal Forgeries of 1867," British Journal for the History of Science 36:131 (December 2003), 437-453. Stephen

The eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815 was a disaster for the Dutch East Indies, but its astonishing consequences were felt around the world, blocking the sun and bringing cold, famine, and disease to millions of people from China to the United States. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll review the volcano's devastating effects and surprising legacy. We'll also appreciate an inverted aircraft and puzzle over a resourceful barber. Intro: The Veterinary Record addressed an overlooked species in 1972. Goats like towers. Map: The 1816 summer temperature anomaly (°C) with respect to 1971-2000 climatology (data source). Sources for our feature on the Tambora eruption: Gillen D'Arcy Wood, Tambora, 2014. William K. Klingaman and Nicholas P. Klingaman, The Year Without a Summer, 2013. Angus M. Gunn, Encyclopedia of Disasters, 2008. Jelle Zeilinga de Boer and Donald Theodore Sanders, Volcanoes in Human History, 2012. Jihong Cole-Dai et al. "Cold Decade (AD 1810–1819) Caused by Tambora (1815) an

In 1882, a mysterious man using a false name married and murdered a well-to-do widow in Essex County, New York. While awaiting the gallows he composed poems, an autobiography, and six enigmatic cryptograms that have never been solved. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll examine the strange case of Henry Debosnys, whose true identity remains a mystery. We'll also consider children's food choices and puzzle over a surprising footrace. Intro: In 1972 two Canadian scientists set out to figure the number of monsters in Loch Ness. Winston Churchill's country home must always maintain a marmalade cat named Jock. Sources for our feature on Henry Debosnys: Cheri L. Farnsworth, Adirondack Enigma, 2010. Craig P. Bauer, Unsolved!, 2017. George Levi Brown, Pleasant Valley: A History of Elizabethtown, Essex County, New York, 1905. Caroline Halstead Barton Royce, Bessboro: A History of Westport, Essex Co., N.Y., 1902. "Debosnys Ciphers," The Cipher Foundation (accessed Oct. 7, 2018). Craig P. Bauer,

In 1863, on the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg, a 69-year-old shoemaker took down his ancient musket and set out to shoot some rebels. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow John Burns' adventures in that historic battle, which made him famous across the nation and won the praise of Abraham Lincoln. We'll also survey some wallabies and puzzle over some underlined 7s. Intro: Alberta has no rats. In a 1963 travel book, Ian Fleming gives James Bond's recipe for scrambled eggs. Sources for our feature on John Burns: Timothy H. Smith, John Burns, 2000. Harry W. Pfanz, Gettysburg: The First Day, 2011. Tom Huntington, "Out to Shoot Some 'Damned Rebels,'" America's Civil War 21:3 (July 2008), 46-49. Eric J. Wittenberg and J. David Petruzzi, "Why JEB Stuart Was Too Late," Civil War Times 46:1 (February 2007), 30-37. Robert L. Bloom, "'We Never Expected a Battle': The Civilians at Gettysburg, 1863," Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies 55:4 (October 1988), 161-200

In 1897, shortly after Zona Shue was found dead in her West Virginia home, her mother went to the county prosecutor with a bizarre story. She said that her daughter had been murdered -- and that her ghost had revealed the killer's identity. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Greenbrier Ghost, one of the strangest courtroom dramas of the 19th century. We'll also consider whether cats are controlling us and puzzle over a delightful oblivion. Intro: Anagrams, a palindrome, and a letter bank regarding American presidents. A crossword without clues, by Lee Sallows. Mary Jane Heaster, Zona's mother. Sources for our feature on the Greenbrier Ghost: Katie Letcher Lyle, The Man Who Wanted Seven Wives, 1986. "The Greenbrier Ghost," West Virginia Division of Culture and History (accessed Sept. 22, 2018). David Jenkins, "Common Law, Mountain Music, and the Construction of Community Identity," Social & Legal Studies 19:3 (September 2010), 351-369. Joel Ebert, "Trials i

In 1769, a Peruvian noblewoman set out with 41 companions to join her husband in French Guiana. But a series of terrible misfortunes left her alone in the Amazon jungle. In this week's episode we'll follow Isabel Godin des Odonais on her harrowing adventure in the rain forest. We'll also learn where in the world "prices slippery traps" is and puzzle over an airport's ingenuity. Intro: In 1949 neurophysiologist Grey Walter built electronic "tortoises" with primitive nervous systems. In 1952 G.V. Carey added an index to his manual of indexing. Sources for our feature on Isabel Godin des Odonais: Anthony Smith, The Lost Lady of the Amazon, 2003. Robert Whitaker, The Mapmaker's Wife, 2004. Jean Godin, "Voyage of Madame Godin Along the River of the Amazons, in the Year 1770," in Charlotte-Adélaïde Dard et al., Perils and Captivity, 1827. Larrie D. Ferreiro, Measure of the Earth, 2011. Edward Julius Goodman, The Explorers of South America, 1992. Londa L. Schiebinger, Plants and Empire, 2009. J. Donald Fernie, "Ma

The end of the Civil War opened a new era of fossil hunting in the American West -- and a bitter feud between two rival paleontologists, who spent 20 years sabotaging one another in a constant struggle for supremacy. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Bone Wars, the greatest scientific feud of the 19th century. We'll also sympathize with Scunthorpe and puzzle over why a driver can't drive. Intro: Nepal's constitution contains instructions for drawing its flag. The tombstone of Constanze Mozart's second husband calls him "the husband of Mozart's widow." Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope. Sources for our feature on the Bone Wars: David Rains Wallace, The Bonehunters' Revenge, 1999. Mark Jaffe, The Gilded Dinosaur, 2000. Elizabeth Noble Shor, The Fossil Feud, 1974. Hal Hellman, Great Feuds in Science, 1998. Tom Huntington, "The Great Feud," American History 33:3 (August 1998), 14. Richard A. Kissel, "The Sauropod Chronicles," Natural History 116:3 (Apr

In 1761 a French schooner was shipwrecked in the Indian Ocean, leaving more than 200 people stranded on a tiny island. The crew departed in a makeshift boat, leaving 60 Malagasy slaves to fend for themselves and wait for rescue. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Tromelin Island castaways, which one observer calls "arguably the most extraordinary story of survival ever documented." We'll also admire some hardworking cats and puzzle over a racer's death. Intro: In 1830 architect Thomas Willson proposed building an enormous pyramid to house London's dead. In 1959 a Norwegian insulation manufacturer undertook to transport a three-ton block of ice to the equator without refrigeration. Sources for our feature on the Tromelin Island castaways: Samir S. Patel, "Castaways," Archaeology, Sept. 15, 2014. "Lèse humanité," Economist, Dec. 16, 2015. Max Guérout, "Esclaves oubliés," La Revue Maritime 477 (December 2006). John Lichfield, "Shipwrecked and Abandoned: The Stor

In 1607, a 15-year-old girl fled her convent in the Basque country, dressed herself as a man, and set out on a series of unlikely adventures across Europe. In time she would distinguish herself fighting as a soldier in Spain's wars of conquest in the New World. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of Catalina de Erauso, the lieutenant nun of Renaissance Spain. We'll also hunt for some wallabies and puzzle over a quiet cat. Intro: In 1856 the Saturday Review asked: Why do ghosts wear clothes? Because of the peculiarities of bee reproduction, the population of each generation is a Fibonacci number. Sources for our feature on Catalina de Erauso: Joaquín María de Ferrer, The Autobiography of doña Catalina de Erauso, 1918 (translated by Dan Harvey Pedrick). Heidi Zogbaum, Catalina de Erauso: The Lieutenant Nun and the Conquest of the New World, 2015. Sonia Pérez-Villanueva, The Life of Catalina de Erauso, the Lieutenant Nun: An Early Modern Autobiography, 2014. Eva Mendieta

In 1902, chemist Harvey Wiley launched a unique experiment to test the safety of food additives. He recruited a group of young men and fed them meals laced with chemicals to see what the effects might be. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe Wiley's "poison squad" and his lifelong crusade for food safety. We'll also follow some garden paths and puzzle over some unwelcome weight-loss news. Intro: In 1887, an inadvertent dot in a telegram cost wool dealer Frank Primrose $20,000. For 25 years, two Minnesota brothers-in-law exchanged a weaponized pair of moleskin pants. Harvey Washington Wiley's poison squad dined in formal clothing and wrote their own inspirational slogan. Sources for our feature: Bernard A. Weisberger, "Doctor Wiley and His Poison Squad," American Heritage 47:1 (February/March 1996). Oscar E. Anderson Jr., The Health of a Nation: Harvey W. Wiley and the Fight for Pure Food, 1958. Paul M. Wax, "Elixirs, Diluents, and the Passage of the 1938 Federal Food, Drug

In 1893, Grover Cleveland discovered a cancerous tumor on the roof of his mouth. It was feared that public knowledge of the president's illness might set off a financial panic, so Cleveland suggested a daring plan: a secret surgery aboard a moving yacht. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll describe the president's gamble -- and the courageous reporter who threatened to expose it. We'll also audit some wallabies and puzzle over some welcome neo-Nazis. Intro: Robert Louis Stevenson inadvertently borrowed much of Treasure Island from Washington Irving. When Graeme Gibson donated his parrot to the Toronto Zoo, it suddenly called after him. Sources for our feature on Grover Cleveland's secret surgery: Matthew Algeo, The President Is a Sick Man: Wherein the Supposedly Virtuous Grover Cleveland Survives a Secret Surgery at Sea and Vilifies the Courageous Newspaperman Who Dared Expose the Truth, 2011. William Williams Keen, The Surgical Operations on President Cleveland in 1893, 1917. Shahid

Cocos Island, in the eastern Pacific, was rumored to hold buried treasure worth millions of dollars, but centuries of treasure seekers had failed to find it. That didn't deter August Gissler, who arrived in 1889 with a borrowed map and an iron determination. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow Gissler's obsessive hunt for the Treasure of Lima. We'll also marvel at the complexity of names and puzzle over an undead corpse. Intro: In 1875, Frederick Law Olmsted warned his son of the dangers of unchecked pussycats. Dogs were formerly so common at church services that "dog whippers" were employed to manage them. Sources for our feature on August Gissler: Ralph Hancock and Julian A. Weston, The Lost Treasure of Cocos Island, 1960. John Chetwood, Our Search for the Missing Millions of Cocos Island: Being an Account of a Curious Cruise and a More Than Curious Character, 1904. Hervey De Montmorency, On the Track of a Treasure: The Story of an Adventurous Expedition to the Pacific Islan

Germany's polar expedition of 1869 took a dramatic turn when 14 men were shipwrecked on an ice floe off the eastern coast of Greenland. As the frozen island carried them slowly toward settlements in the south, it began to break apart beneath them. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow the crew of the Hansa on their desperate journey toward civilization. We'll also honor a slime mold and puzzle over a reversing sunset. Intro: The yellow-bellied longclaw, Macronyx flavigaster, could produce the long-sought 10×10 word square. Bruckner's seventh symphony has made generations of cymbalists nervous. A ground plan of the "Hansa house," from expedition commander Karl Koldewey's 1874 narrative. Sources for our feature on the Hansa: Fergus Fleming, Ninety Degrees North: The Quest for the North Pole, 2007. William James Mills, Exploring Polar Frontiers: A Historical Encyclopedia, 2003. David Thomas Murphy, German Exploration of the Polar World: A History, 1870-1940, 2002. Karl Koldewey, Th

Here are six new lateral thinking puzzles -- play along with us as we try to untangle some perplexing situations using yes-or-no questions. Here are the sources for this week's puzzles. In a few places we've included links to further information -- these contain spoilers, so don't click until you've listened to the episode: Puzzle #1 was contributed by listener Amy Howard. Puzzle #2 was suggested by an item on the podcast No Such Thing as a Fish. Here are some corroborating links: 1, 2, 3, 4 Puzzle #3 was inspired by an item in Jerry Clark and Ed Palattella's 2015 book A History of Heists, and here's a link. Puzzle #4 was devised by Sharon. Here are two links; note that both contain some nudity. Puzzle #5 is from listener Justin Sabe, who was inspired by an item on the podcast 99% Invisible. Puzzle #6 is from listener Sam Dyck, who sent these links. You can listen using the player above, download this episode directly, or subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Google Play Music or via the RSS feed at https:

In 1883 fisherman Howard Blackburn was caught in a blizzard off the coast of Newfoundland. Facing bitter cold in an 18-foot boat, he passed through a series of harrowing adventures in a desperate struggle to stay alive and find help. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow Blackburn's dramatic story, which made him famous around the world. We'll also admire a runaway chicken and puzzle over a growing circle of dust. Intro: During Oxfordshire's annual stag hunt in 1819, the quarry took refuge in a chapel. With the introduction of electric light, some American cities erected "moonlight towers." Sources for our feature on Howard Blackburn: Joseph E. Garland, Lone Voyager: The Extraordinary Adventures of Howard Blackburn, Hero Fisherman of Gloucester, 1963. Louis Arthur Norton, "The Hero of Gloucester," American History 35:5 (December 2000), 22. "The Terrible Odyssey of Howard Blackburn," American Heritage 33:2 (February/March 1982). Peter Nielsen, "Howard Blackburn: Heroism at Sea,"

In 1726 London was rocked by a bizarre sensation: A local peasant woman began giving birth to rabbits, astounding the city and baffling the medical community. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll review the strange case of Mary Toft, which has been called "history's most fascinating medical mystery." We'll also ponder some pachyderms and puzzle over some medical misinformation. Intro: The notion of music without substance raises some perplexing philosophical puzzles. Japanese haiku master Masaoka Shiki wrote nine verses about baseball. Sources for our feature on Mary Toft: Dennis Todd, Imagining Monsters: Miscreations of the Self in Eighteenth-Century England, 1995. Clifford A. Pickover, The Girl Who Gave Birth to Rabbits: A True Medical Mystery, 2000. Richard Gordon, Great Medical Mysteries, 1984. Lisa Forman Cody, Birthing the Nation: Sex, Science, and the Conception of Eighteenth-Century Britons, 2005. Wendy Moore, "Of Rabbit and Humble Pie," British Medical Journal 338 (May 7, 2009

In 1961, Wisconsin optometrist Arthur Duperrault chartered a yacht to take his family on a sailing holiday in the Bahamas. After two days in the islands, the ship failed to return to the mainland, and the unfolding story of its final voyage made headlines around the world. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll recount the fate of the Bluebelle and its seven passengers and crew. We'll also sympathize with some digital misfits and puzzle over some incendiary cigarettes. Intro: John Brunner's novel The Squares of the City encodes an 1892 chess game between Wilhelm Steinitz and Mikhail Chigorin. Around 1730 Ben Franklin laid out 11 "necessary hints to those that would be rich." Sources for our feature on the Bluebelle: Richard D. Logan and Tere Duperrault Fassbender, Alone: Orphaned on the Ocean, 2011. "The Sea: The Bluebelle's Last Voyage," Time, Dec. 1, 1961. Herbert Brean, "The 'Bluebelle' Mystery," Life, Dec. 1, 1961. Erle Stanley Gardner, "The Case of the Bluebelle's Last Voyage," Sa

Swiss physicist Auguste Piccard opened two new worlds in the 20th century. He was the first person to fly 10 miles above the earth and the first to travel 2 miles beneath the sea, using inventions that opened the doors to these new frontiers. In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll follow Piccard on his historic journeys into the sky and the sea. We'll also admire some beekeeping serendipity and puzzle over a sudden need for locksmiths. Intro: Herbert Hoover's doctor invented a game to keep him in shape. William Howard Taft boasted that he lost 70 pounds on this diet. Sources for our feature on Auguste Piccard: Auguste Piccard, Between Earth and Sky, 1950. Auguste Piccard, Earth, Sky and Sea, 1956. Alan Honour, Ten Miles High, Two Miles Deep: The Adventures of the Piccards, 1957. Fergus Fleming and Annabel Merulla, eds., The Explorer's Eye, 2005. Tom Cheshire, The Explorer Gene: How Three Generations of One Family Went Higher, Deeper, and Further Than Any Before, 2013. Markus Pagitz, "Th