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Welcome to Erin Menke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and mild.
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Our world is full of the unexplainable. And if history is an open book, all of these amazing tales are right there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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Secrecy is everything. Mexican masked wrestling, also called lucha libre, is a world that prizes discretion above all else. The luchadors fight dressed as colorful, larger than life characters, their true identities closely guarded secrets. But one particular luchador spent his career hiding in plain sight. As Reverend Sergio Gutierrez Benitez. He was a warrior in the church's holy fight between good and evil. And as the masked luchador Fray Tormenta, AKA Father Storm, he took that fight to the ring. Fray Tormenta didn't start out as a luchador or even a priest. He was born in 1945 in the Mexican state of Hidalgo and grew up with 16 brothers and sisters. Young Tormenta quickly became a fan of luchador films, which were low budget, action packed films starring masked wrestlers that became popular in the 1960s. By the time he was 22 years old, Tormenta was looking for a new path in life. He'd had trouble with drugs and alcohol and wanted a higher purpose to focus on. So he joined the priesthood. Tormenta ended up in the city of Texcoco, where he opened an orphanage, where, remembering the way the priesthood helped him, he vowed that he would never turn away a child in need. But he quickly discovered this was easier said than done. Every child meant another mouth to feed, more clothes to buy and more heat to use. The bills were piling up and the archdiocese could only help so much. So Tormenta came up with a new idea. He would train as a masked wrestler and win the money to help the orphanage. His character would be a priest named Fray Tormenta, or Friar Storm. And after all, who would suspect a real priest of posing as a fake one? He was sure his gimmick as a fighting priest would be so successful that he'd be able to expand the orphanage and create a whole city for children in need. Of course, it didn't work out that way. In fact, at Fray Tormenta's first match in 1973, he only won about $20. But Tormenta kept at it, and bit by bit, he was able to make ends meet for the orphanage. Soon, rumors spread that the wrestling priest was a real father. And eventually the stories reached the ears of the archdiocese. In 1976, Tormenta was called in to meet with the bishop, his superior at the archdiocese, the bishop asked Tormenta if he had heard anything about a wrestling priest, and Tormenta decided to come clean. He admitted that by day he was preaching the gospel, and by night he was pile driving luchadors. The bishop, of course, was furious. He demanded Tormenta quit at once, and Tormenta agreed on one condition. That the bishop provide the orphanage with the same funds that Tormenta had been winning from Lucha libre. After some reflection, the bishop replied that he could keep wrestling. Eventually, word got out that Tormenta was in fact a real priest, which caused problems at his fights. His fans would throw tomatoes at the other fighters, telling them that they were going to hell for laying their hands on a priest. But the discovery of his identity actually brought Tormenta closer to the other luchadors. Many of them started seeking him out for confession after matches and asking him for spiritual advice. Fray Tormenta retired from wrestling in 2001, but today still sports his mask at Sunday services. His orphanage has moved, but it now offers food, housing, education and and lucha training to dozens of young boys. One of his proteges has even taken up his mantle, fighting as Fray Tormenta Jr. Today, Fray Tormenta has been immortalized in comic books, TV shows, and several films, including the 2006 Jack Black comedy Nacho Libre. But the father counts something else as his greatest achievement. In 2015, he told an interviewer that he's helped over 2,000 children through his orphanage. He said, I have so much to be thankful for. Three doctors, 16 teachers, one public accountant, one private accountant, one priest, 20 computer technicians, and five lawyers have all come out of the orphanage. It may not be as dramatic as a suplex, but changing so many lives is one heck of a finishing move. Of the many things that we take for granted in the modern world, geography is chief among them. Not just the terrain itself, which we can now cross with ease in many places, but the human distribution of land. In America, we just accept that there are 50 states. Minnesota looks like a chef's hat. Louisiana looks like a boot. Michigan has that weird Upper Peninsula. It's all been this way for well over a century in most cases. So why question it? Well, it turns out the last one has a seriously curious story behind it. With a lot to teach us, Michigan's seemingly arbitrary boundaries came at great cost. The state gained its Upper Peninsula after a war, and not just any war, but one with a neighboring state. In 1817, Michigan was still a territory, but Ohio had already become a state. And the two just couldn't agree over where Ohio's northern border ended. And Michigan's southern border began. A treaty dating all the way back to 1787 claimed that Michigan's southern border is a line that runs east from the southern tip of Lake Michigan all the way to Lake Erie. That is to say, where Lake Michigan ends, so does the territory of Michigan. But, of course, there were no satellites back then to provide perfect images of the earth. Human surveyors had to go out and take their own measurements to determine the exact shape of the land. Two separate surveys, one commissioned by the governor of the territory of Michigan and one by the governor of Ohio, conveniently found that Lake Michigan ends in two different spots. The Ohioans thought that it ended further north, and the Michiganders thought that it ended farther south. Go figure. The land in between these two points became known as the Toledo Strip. Imagine a thick strip of land that runs across Michigan's southern border from Lake Michigan to Lake Erie. The strip was so named because it contained the city of Toledo, which is on the mouth of the Maumee river off Lake Erie. At the time, this was an important trade route, worth a lot to whatever state or territory controlled it. And eventually, Michigan was able to prove their claim. And if you look at a modern map, you can tell that they are indeed right. Lake Michigan goes farther south than Toledo, although just barely. So they took control of Toledo for a time. But by 1825, the Erie Canal was completed in New York. This connected Lake Erie to the Hudson river, which flows south from upstate New York to New York Harbor. So now ships could travel all the way from New York harbor, up the Hudson river and across Lake Erie and arrive in Toledo. The region became so economically important that by 1833, Ohio suddenly began to claim once again that they were the rightful owners of Toledo. When Michigan tried to gain statehood later that year, Ohio used its influence in Congress to prevent Michigan from joining the Union. In 1835, Ohio sent new surveyors to the Toledo Strip to try and prove once and for all that it belonged to them. And Michigan, still raw at being blocked from statehood, sent a posse of 30 lawmen to arrest those surveyors. It was war. Michigan sent even more lawmen and soldiers to Toledo to keep the peace and prevent an invasion from Ohio. And one of those Michigan lawmen was stabbed by a guy from Ohio that he was trying to arrest. He lived, don't worry. And as far as we know, he was the only one injured in this interstate conflict because things were about to be settled at the federal level. Although some members of Congress supported Michigan, who were clearly in the right President Andrew Jackson did not. He disapproved of Michigan's armed response to Ohio, so he gave Toledo to Ohio, which seemed like a major victory at the time. But Jackson was also smart enough to grant Michigan statehood in 1836 and give them the unclaimed Upper Peninsula to the north of their territory as consolation. This proved to be just as valuable. Explorers soon discovered that the peninsula was rich in copper and iron. Today, it's curious to see how things have shaken out. Michigan and Ohio have comparable economies and population sizes, but Toledo is not the prized jewel that it once was. It's a major trade hub, but the population has declined after the loss of manufacturing jobs. Meanwhile, the Upper Peninsula is known for its incredible views of the Great Lakes and pristine nature. It's all a matter of perspective. Both areas have their pros and cons, but it is curious that by giving up one city that was rightfully theirs, the people of Michigan gained more beauty than they could have ever imagined.
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I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts or learn more about the show by visiting curiositiespodcast.com the show was created by me.
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Erin Manke, in partnership with How Stuff Works.
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I make another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series and television show and you can learn all about it over at theworldoflore. Com and until next time, stay curious.