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- [00:00]
Erin Menke
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.
- [00:04]
American Public University Announcer
This show is sponsored by American Public University. The future won't wait and neither should you. That's why American Public University offers Master's programs designed for momentum, affordable, high quality and flexible. So you keep moving forward with career relevant programs in business, healthcare, education, it and more. You can gain skills you can use right away and and the confidence to power your next move. American Public University made for what's next. Learn more at apu. Apus. Edu.
- [00:39]
Erin Menke
Welcome to Erin Menke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild.
- [00:48]
Aaron Manke
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. She grew up in an African Paradise. Born in 1940 in Kenya, Wangari Maathai was surrounded by trees, plains and rivers. She could see all kinds of exotic animals right in her own backyard. By the time she reached adulthood, new programs in the United States and Kenya encouraged Kenyan women to receive the education they had previously been denied. Wangari took advantage of this. She had grown up seeing how women in Kenya were often treated. They were told to submit to their husbands and be easy to control, to not develop any skills outside of homemaking. And that wasn't the life that Wangari wanted. She received an undergraduate degree in biology at a university in Atchison, Kansas, of all places, and then a master's degree in biological sciences at a university in Pittsburgh. She then returned home to Kenya and attended the University of Nairobi, where in 1971, she became the first woman in all of East Africa to earn a doctorate, a PhD in veterinary anatomy. Her education was clearly an adventure unto itself. But her story had only just begun, because as she worked at the university, more and more women from local villages came to ask for her help. Their water sources were drying up, their trees were dying, and they were having to walk farther and farther for food, water and firewood. Wangari was shocked to hear that the paradise she had grown up in was falling apart. She set out to investigate and found a clear cause of this problem. Large commercial farms and tea plantations were diverting water for themselves and driving the surrounding villages into desolation and poverty. These enterprises were owned by the wealthy of Kenya and sometimes even by foreign investors. Putting her degrees into incredible use, Wangari devised a plan to plant hundreds of trees in the country. Not only would they provide the villages with food and firewood, their roots would help the Rivers to retain more water. Eventually, this project, founded in 1977, came to be known as the Greenbelt movement. The project wasn't just good for the environment, though. It also provided women with employment and educational opportunities. Kenya was backsliding into anti women policies at the time, once again denying them greater roles in society. Planting trees helped to restore several villages, and Wengari felt that Kenya was beginning to turn toward a sustainable future. But by 1989, it was becoming increasingly clear that the country's president, Daniel Arat Moy, was a corrupt dictator, more interested in selling off the country's resources than helping its people. President Moy wanted to help a British millionaire build an office park right in the middle of Uhuru Park, a massive green space in the center of Nairobi. Wangari couldn't stomach the idea of losing so many trees in what was already an urban area. She mobilized an international pressure campaign, bringing attention to the issue and raising money to sue the government. The courts sided with Wangari, and the plan to build the office park was blocked. But this is when President Moi decided to show his true colors. He had Wangari and her followers arrested and charged with treason. They were set to be executed, but were saved at the last minute by humanitarian pressure from the United States. It might have been surprising to the rest of the world, but Wangari had seen her whole life how strong women were dealt with in Kenya. She wasn't afraid, and she was determined to keep fighting moist government. She continued to grow the Greenbelt movement until it spread to 30 other countries, planting literally millions of trees and providing employment and community for many disenfranchised people. She spoke out at every opportunity about corruption in Africa and how Western corporations were continuing to create inequality there. By 2002, the movement had thrown its weight behind a candidate named Imwai Kibaki, A challenger to Moi's presidency. Kibaki won the election and made Wangari his environmental minister. She had spent years doing everything she could to give back to the country that had provided her with such an idyllic childhood. Not only that, she had transformed it into a more sustainable place and a place where women could have more of a chance at equality. Wangari had not done any of this for the accolades, which made it all the more surprising to her when in 2004, she became the first African woman to be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. This sent a clear message to Western corporations that their plunder of Africa wasn't just bad for the environment, it was bad for people. It was truly inhumane. It might seem curious to some that the environment could be so closely linked to justice. But after all, people can't live without land and resources to provide for them. And it takes brave, tireless individuals like Wangari to remind us of that sacred connection between humanity and the earth.
- [06:20]
American Public University Announcer
This show is sponsored by American Public University. The future won't wait, and neither should you. That's why American Public University offers Master's programs designed for momentum, affordable, high quality and flexible. So you keep moving forward with career relevant programs in business, healthcare, education, it and more. You can gain skills you can use right away and and the confidence to power your next move. American Public University made for what's next? Learn more at apu. Apus.
- [06:50]
Aaron Manke
Edu Amazon Health AI presents Painful Thoughts
- [06:56]
Erin Menke
why did I search the Internet for answers to my cold sore problem? Now I'm stuck down a rabbit hole filled with images of alarmingly graphic sores in various stages of ooze. I can clear my search history, but I can never unsee that.
- [07:14]
Aaron Manke
Don't go down the rabbit hole. Amazon Health AI gets you the right care fast. Healthcare just got less painful. Elmer was born in Maine in 1880, but by the age of 20 he was headed west to start a new life. After his mother and grandfather died, he drifted through the Midwest, falling into a life of crime and joining a band of outlaws. He was the explosives guy, but he never quite got the hang of the job. For example, while trying to crack a safe during a train robbery, Elmer accidentally used too much dynamite and melted all the silver coins he was trying to steal. A few months later, during a bank heist, he managed to blow up the entire bank except for the safe, which remained unopened. Like I said, he was not the best at what he did. One other failure took place in October of 1911. That's when Elmer's crew tried to hijack a train carrying $400,000 as it passed through Oklahoma. It was supposed to be one of the biggest heists in US History, but when Elmer and his accomplices climbed on board, they realized they had stopped the wrong train. The safe was completely empty, and the would be bandits made off with just $46 and a jug of whiskey. It would help the story if at this point you just closed your eyes, gently shook your head and muttered with a sigh, oh, Elmer. The very next morning, law enforcement caught up with Elmer, who was hiding in a barn in Oklahoma. There was an hour long standoff that involved a lot of shooting, but it ended when Elmer was shot in the chest. His body was taken to a local funeral home and Embalmed. I mean, that was their job, right? And they did it well. But because Elmer had no family, his body went unclaimed. Not for days, not for weeks, but for years. And that was when the second act of his story began. At some point, two carnival promoters purchased Elmer's corpse from the funeral home. And propped him up as an exhibit in their traveling show, promoting him as the outlaw who would never be captured. And over the 50 years that followed, his body changed hands over and over again, Making the rounds through more than a few traveling sideshows. And then in 1968, he was sold to the Hollywood Wax Museum. But when the museum closed for good later that same year, Elmer's corpse got jumbled up among all the wax mannequins. And that's a lot, isn't it? Few of us will take such a journey in life. And Elmer did it all while stiff as a board. He might not have been good as an outlaw, but Elmer sure knew how to get around. In the 1970s, a camera crew was setting up at an abandoned theme park in Long Beach, California, called the House of Horrors. They were getting ready to film an episode of a TV show called the Six Million Dollar Man. Inside one of the creepy old rides, which was decorated with skeletons and wax mannequins. The director looked through the camera's viewfinder and told one of the crew members to move a glow in the dark mannequin that was hanging from a noose in the corner of the frame. The crew member grabbed the hanged man by the arm, and when he gave it a tug, the arm snapped off. As the director and the cameraman laughed about it, the crew member took a closer look. And in the center of the broken arm was a brittle, white human bone. This was no mannequin. It was an actual mummified corpse. The film crew stopped laughing and immediately called the police. When the coroner's office took the mummy in the they found a few bizarre hints to the man's identity. His body was riddled with bullets that were more than 70 years old. In his pockets, they found ticket stubs to a wax museum. And in his mouth was a Corroded penny dated 1924. It took a little bit of detective work, but they eventually put a name to the mummy. He was a Wild west outlaw named Elmer McCurdy. In April of 1977, Elmer was finally buried in a cemetery in Oklahoma. Two feet of concrete were poured over his grave to ensure that after all the years of exploitation, Elmer would finally be able to rest in one piece. I hope you enjoyed today's guided tour through the Cabinet of Curiosities. This show was created by me, Aaron Manke in partnership with iHeart Podcasts, researched and written by the Grim and Mile team and produced by by Jesse Funk. Learn more about the show and the people who make it over@grimandmild.com curiosities. You'll also find a link to the official Cabinet of Curiosities hardcover book available in bookstores and online, as well as ebook and audiobook. And if you're looking for an ad free option, consider joining our Patreon. It's all the same stories but without the interruption for a small monthly fee. Learn more and sign up over at patreon.com grab grim and mild and until next time, stay curious.
- [12:12]
American Public University Announcer
This show is sponsored by American Public University. The future won't wait and neither should you. That's why American Public University offers Master's programs designed for momentum, affordable, high quality and flexible so you keep moving forward. With career relevant programs in business, healthcare, education, IT and more, you can gain skills you can use right away and the confidence to power your next move. American Public University made for what's next. Learn more at Apu Apus. Edu.
- [12:43]
Erin Menke
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.