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- [00:00]
Ben Bowlin
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to the show, fellow ridiculous historians. Thank you as always, so much for tuning in. We're running a little late on this one and it's my fault, you know. Shout out to our super producer, Mr. Max Williams.
- [00:45]
Noel Brown
That's the top.
- [00:47]
Max Williams
When have we ever hit a tent pole topic on time? This is in classic ridiculous history fashion that we're two days late for said holiday.
- [00:55]
Noel Brown
I am proud of myself, so I'm going to toot my own horn and talk about myself right now. But I. On February 29th last year, we had an episode about the leap year.
- [01:06]
Ben Bowlin
We did, we did.
- [01:07]
Noel Brown
And I write a Thanksgiving grab bag esque episode, but I think that's about it. I think one time we might have gotten lucky, but we did our. Was it Labor Day? We did like either two months before or two months after Labor Day. And I'm like, this is marvelous. I love this.
- [01:21]
Max Williams
I don't know why we're letting on that it's not on purpose.
- [01:25]
Ben Bowlin
It's very. Oh, folks, that is Noel Brown recently returned from Philadelphia. So Noel, AKA Young Cheesesteak Brown.
- [01:35]
Max Williams
Yeah, okay, yeah, sure. Cheesesteak is accurate. I had a couple of those from. What is it? Angelo's and Ishka Bibbles, which are two. You know, I think Angelo's is kind of hot right now, but a lot of people know about Ishka Bibbles and it's the funnest named place to get a sandwich in the history of sandwiches, if you ask me.
- [01:52]
Ben Bowlin
And we're accountability buddies, so I was. It is a true story, Noel. I. They call me Ben. I was bugging you the whole time you were in Philly and I just kept texting you on multiple threads to ask for cheesesteak pictures.
- [02:11]
Max Williams
It's the only reason I had the second steak, Ben. It's the only reason I went to Ishka Bibbles. It was just for you. I only had about three bites and then I had to throw away the rest because, man, those things are not meant to be consumed in their entirety by one human person. That's a heart attack waiting to happen.
- [02:27]
Ben Bowlin
I don't know how Philly does it, man. I don't know.
- [02:30]
Max Williams
I guess he's got to walk a lot, which I did do. I had a great time. Thanks for mentioning it. But yeah, no, Cheesesteaks are delightful, as are nonsensical holidays that are designed to potentially hurt people's feelings or delights. Results may vary.
- [02:50]
Jeremy Scott
Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to Killing Michelle Schofield in In Bone Valley season one.
- [02:57]
Gilbert King
Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.
- [03:01]
Jeremy Scott
I was becoming the bridge between Jeremy Scott and the son he'd never known.
- [03:06]
Gilbert King
At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.
- [03:09]
Jeremy Scott
Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2, starting April 9 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
- [03:23]
Ben Bowlin
So we're running late on our April Fool's Day episode. That's what this is. And you and I have talked about it in the past on and off air. I feel like it can be a mean spirited holiday.
- [03:38]
Max Williams
It certainly can be. I have been the victim, not that big a deal, but of some not so nice April Fool's pranks. But I guess it's all in how you play it. If you play it a little too straight about something a little too serious, you know, things could go wrong. But if it's something sort of like light hearted and a little bit absurdist, I'm all about that.
- [04:04]
Ben Bowlin
Right. Like if, for instance, I gave, I gave my, my dad a mug that said world's best grandfather and then said April Fools, that would be really extreme.
- [04:18]
Max Williams
Yeah, but even that's on the lighter end of extreme, if you ask me. I was punked quite successfully by my kid who's 16. I was playing a piece of music that I've been working on when I was in Philadelphia and Eden looked at me and goes, you know what, Dad, I gotta tell you, this isn't very good.
- [04:36]
Noel Brown
What?
- [04:37]
Max Williams
I don't like it. It sounds like butt, I believe is the term that they used. And then I really it. My heart sunk, man. My heart sunk. And then they very quickly saw the forlornness in my eyes and very quickly responded with a quick April fool, which I was, wow, kids are mean, dude.
- [05:00]
Ben Bowlin
Kids are mean, dude. That's an in depth example of April Fools. Or those are two light examples from us. I think the worst one I got was, ooh, it's not even fit for the air. It was pretty extreme. It was pretty mean. But if you want to learn more about famous examples of April Fool's Day, you can check out our earlier episode on the epic spaghetti trees prank by.
- [05:33]
Max Williams
The BBC, which I think is a perfect example of a light hearted absurdist one, because the BBC created this thing to appear like a legitimate documentary about an absolutely bazonkers talk topic. And like they had like these old like Italian nonnas, like harvesting spaghetti from the trees. In the Italian countryside. And like, let's say you do believe it. What's the worst outcome there that you feel like a little bit of a dumb. Dumb, you know, okay, not the end of the world, but the spaghetti is.
- [06:05]
Ben Bowlin
Not going to taste different.
- [06:06]
Max Williams
No, it's certainly not. Another example that really did ruffle some feathers and potentially cause some harm, but would not have been considered an April Fool's joke is Orson Welles War of the worlds broadcast where a lot of people took that very, very seriously and thought the aliens were coming and they fled for shelter, called the police repeatedly, clogged up the lines and all of that good stuff, only for it to turn out to have been a very well produced radio play.
- [06:33]
Ben Bowlin
Right. And worth a listen. Still, both examples that you just named there, Noel. As April first approached, we asked ourselves, what is this holiday exactly? Where does it come from? How did it spread across the globe? And I, we were all startled to learn the answer is kind of ridiculous. So before we get into this fool's errand. Huh?
- [07:04]
Max Williams
No. Yes. Which is a term that I've used plenty in my life, and I never really thought about the origins of it, but it certainly does date back to the early days of being an April fool.
- [07:16]
Ben Bowlin
So. Okay, okay. Noel, can you kick it for. For all of us historians in the crowd. Ridiculous variety. If you had to explain to an alien what April Fool's day is, how would you explain it?
- [07:31]
Max Williams
It is a day where it is acceptable to lie to the people that you love for comedic effect.
- [07:37]
Ben Bowlin
Holy smokes. That is good.
- [07:40]
Max Williams
Kind of dark, though. It's dark.
- [07:42]
Ben Bowlin
It's dark. No, we're keeping it. We're keeping it, man. Because that is poetry. It's a celebration of pranks and practical jokes. In most countries today, it happens on the first day of the month we call April. You run into any number of jokes or in person practical, like pranks. And usually when someone is lying to someone that they love, as he said at the end of the bit, the prankster will yell April Fools at their big reveal. And what. What I think we both found astonishing about this is that multiple countries have their own variations. You could be an April fish.
- [08:32]
Max Williams
You could be.
- [08:36]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's go to.
- [08:38]
Max Williams
I think it's Les. Les poisson davril.
- [08:41]
Ben Bowlin
Ah. Ah, yes. Yeah. Put the definitive on that. Yeah, The. The idea. I love that you're bringing up the French. The idea here is that said no one ever. What?
- [08:54]
Max Williams
I'm just kidding. We love the French.
- [08:56]
Ben Bowlin
They're great. I do. I do. So perhaps this is a reference to a young fish that is easily caught. We're pulling some of this straight up from our friends at Britannica. We did not know, or I did not know that it is common for French kids to pin paper fish on the backs of folks they're pranking. Kind of like how we would put a kick me sign.
- [09:28]
Max Williams
Just like a kick me sign. Exactly. Or like, you know, a pin the tail on the donkey situation, to quote Larry David, which is a cruel and violent game. Why would you do this? No, actually, I think it was pinata that he was talking about. But pin the tail on the donkey, similarly violent and a little bit cruel.
- [09:47]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. Doesn't it pin the tail of the donkey?
- [09:53]
Max Williams
Maybe not. Well, how does that game work? Don't you stick it on people and they spin around or something? And maybe I'm.
- [09:59]
Ben Bowlin
No, you spin the kid on the. Before they hit the pinata.
- [10:02]
Max Williams
That's true. But I swear there's a variation of pin the tail.
- [10:06]
Noel Brown
All right, I'm here. I'm here. The youthful guy on the show will jump in here since it's closer to my childhood than it's yours. So pin the tail on the donkey. There's like a donkey, like, painting type of thing on a wall. You put a blindfold on somebody, you hand them the pin, and they have a general idea where it is. But you got to see how close you can get it to actually getting the tail on the right spot.
- [10:26]
Max Williams
You spin them around, don't you, to disorient them. Isn't the idea house rules?
- [10:31]
Ben Bowlin
That's house rules.
- [10:32]
Max Williams
Okay, fair enough.
- [10:33]
Noel Brown
It's all kind of awful because the only way you're doing this off of your memory, trying to figure out where it is, if you get spun around, you're going to go put it in somebody's arm. But to your point, Noel, I mean, think about it. Like, we have, like, basically intentionally removed a donkey's tail, and now we are trying to attach another one to it. That is. That is so twisted.
- [10:52]
Ben Bowlin
I wonder.
- [10:52]
Noel Brown
Twisted, Max, with the facts I've ever heard.
- [10:55]
Ben Bowlin
Okay, we'll do it. We'll do the sound cue. We'll do the sound cue.
- [10:59]
Jeremy Scott
Who's that sneaking in the phone? It's Max, and he's full of knowledge.
- [11:06]
Max Williams
Just for you right now.
- [11:07]
Jeremy Scott
Here it comes with the facts.
- [11:12]
Ben Bowlin
I do wonder whether there has ever been a, like, an earlier version where was an actual tortured donkey.
- [11:22]
Max Williams
Oh, dear.
- [11:24]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. Too dark. Too dark. All right, so let's go to Scotland. In Scotland, it's Hunt the Guac. Or the Go. It's a symbol of the fool. And then, yeah, sure.
- [11:41]
Max Williams
Very similar to what we might have over here in, like, Boy Scout campouts, which is the old snipe hunt. The idea of, you know, taking a noob and sort of convincing them that it's a rite of passage to hunt this mythical beast and sending them out after a thing that does not exist, which is very much the fool's errand of it all, you know, or very much a wild goose chase situation.
- [12:05]
Ben Bowlin
Sure. A version of that occurs in modern production, film and tv. Friends, you'll know this. One of the hazing rituals for like a new kid or a PA in production, a production assistant is to give them a super obscure official sounding name for a thing, piece of equipment, and send them hunting for it. And it's a clothespin.
- [12:35]
Max Williams
Yeah, it's called like an M432 or some sort of like numerical kind of model number type thing. And now I'm totally forgetting what it was because they referred to them as that actually on sets and in film situations. Another one that's interesting too is in construction sites. Gosh. I saw this on a TV show recently. But they were sent a young newbie construction worker, like house framer, looking for a. Like a window stretcher or something like that. Like some kind of, like, device that is meant to do something that really the only way to do it is manually.
- [13:09]
Noel Brown
So to jump in here real quick, I'm just thinking about. As you guys know, I worked, I managed restaurants in state Atlanta.
- [13:14]
Ben Bowlin
What'd you guys do? What'd you do? Oh, so what was your snipe hunt?
- [13:17]
Noel Brown
This gets more. This gets more evil as the story goes on. Because one of the best things about it is it's not me, but four different restaurant managers working with each other on this. On this prank. And so there's a search of these restaurants and there's like four within, like five minutes walking to each other. So basically, what we would usually do when one of the places start, there's a new employee who seemed pretty cool, like, wouldn't get offended if we did this to them. They just understand some hazing is one of us would send a person with a bucket to go get a bucket of steam. And they steam. You can't put steam in a bucket. Like, oh, no, that's the name of the product. Just go over to this place. And so they go over that place and the manager who knows this is like, dude. Oh, you guys have. You guys are out of steam too. Yeah, the delivery Must not come in.
- [13:58]
Ben Bowlin
But you gotta go to the third guy.
- [14:00]
Noel Brown
The third. But, but like we get all of this stuff from US Foods. They get their stuff from Cisco, so they should be good. And then like the third person's like, yeah, no, we, we. Sorry, the owners cut it off. Like, you guys have been borrowing way too much steam from us. You can't do it. So this person's just walking around Grant park neighborhood with a ice bucket, a big giant ice bucket over and over again until one of the managers breaks their breaks. Like you know the joke. They're laughing and they're, oh, I have been walking around for 30 minutes in the hot sun of Atlanta.
- [14:30]
Ben Bowlin
Well, eventually it would turn to steam.
- [14:33]
Noel Brown
Yeah, there you go.
- [14:34]
Max Williams
It would take a while. It would take a while. It just goes to show that April fool can be every day in certain situations. I found a couple other examples of the job site stuff. One would be a to your point, Max, or similar to your story, a bucket of ohms. Ohms being a way of measuring electrical resistance, which is not a thing that can be held in a bucket. A wire stretcher, a flex bender, a pack of end joints or a box of toenails.
- [14:58]
Ben Bowlin
I do have a box of toenails. We're not going to get into it.
- [15:01]
Max Williams
Keep those around you. Just, you just hang on to them for, for posterity.
- [15:05]
Ben Bowlin
I believe in magic. So there's, there's a, there's another example. We used to do this thing where you would have like a new recruit. You would. You would have them dig a hole and then you would yell at them for digging the hole wrong and you would ask them to move the hole or you would send them to a different guy who would get mad that anyone like that you were there was very kill the messenger. It was just a way to make people do more push ups.
- [15:39]
Max Williams
Sure, Ben. Can you imagine if someone came up with a movable hole? That would be a million dollar idea to say so this is all of these kinds of things. These had. Gowchy day was another thing they referred to it as in scot hunt the goalk. Very similar to our snipe hunt that we know. Tally day was the following day where people would pin oftentimes kick me signs on folks back similar to the fish situation over there in France. All of these rituals are part of a relatively and surprisingly ancient practice that spans cultures, continents, and of course time. The custom of dedicating a single day to the embracing of harmless pranks and merriment on one's friends, neighbors and loved ones, ones with a sort of built in amnesty where you can't really get mad about it. But boy, some of these are worthy of getting mad about, you know, if you get really done dirty.
- [16:39]
Jeremy Scott
Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley Season one.
- [16:46]
Max Williams
I just knew him as a kid.
- [16:48]
Jeremy Scott
Long silent voices from his past came.
- [16:52]
Gilbert King
Forward and he was just staring at me.
- [16:55]
Jeremy Scott
And they had secrets of their own to share.
- [16:58]
Gilbert King
Gilbert King I'm the son of Jeremy Lynn Scott.
- [17:04]
Jeremy Scott
I was no longer just telling the story. I was part of it.
- [17:08]
Gilbert King
Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.
- [17:13]
Jeremy Scott
I was becoming the bridge between a killer and the son he'd never known.
- [17:17]
Gilbert King
If the cops and everything would have done the job properly, my dad would have been in jail. I would have never existed.
- [17:22]
Jeremy Scott
I never expected to find myself in this place. Now I need to tell you how I got here.
- [17:29]
Gilbert King
At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.
- [17:32]
Jeremy Scott
Bone Valley Season 2 Jeremy, Jeremy, I.
- [17:37]
Max Williams
Want to tell you something.
- [17:38]
Jeremy Scott
Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2 starting April 9 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear the entire new season ad free with exclusive content starting April 9th, subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
- [18:01]
Ben Bowlin
Right, and we were looking into this and we found that April Fool's Day is itself kind of a mixtape of much earlier festivals. Things like Hilaria of Ancient World, the.
- [18:14]
Max Williams
Name of that, so much. It sounds like a real fun festival.
- [18:18]
Ben Bowlin
Yes, it was on March 25, so not too far away. People would dress up in disguises. You could mock fellow citizens. And back in Roman times, people genuinely believed this was inspired by. It was like inspired by earlier Egyptian mythology. And then you could go to another Tom Foolery celebration that continues today in India, the Holly Celebration. H O L I well, it also.
- [18:53]
Max Williams
I mean it reminds me even of like the Carnival season, like in Brazil or the way that's been embraced and sort of changed around to suit the New Orleans culture. I mean, and even in Germany and in Europe they've got something called fasching, which is very much around that carnival season, but it contains a lot of that same kind of stuff. Little pranks, little jokes, merriment. Hell, even Halloween has a certain prank quality to it, right? The trick or the treat, right? I mean a lot of these things are cross pollinated and there are bits of it in various different holidays and seasons, even within a Single culture.
- [19:27]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah, absolutely. We see a larger trend here. And if we look at the ancient past, staying with that for a moment, we also have to consider things like Saturnalia. It was the winter festival, you know, that everybody, Everybody celebrated at the end of December. If you survived the harrowing winter, you danced, you drank, you made merry, you gave each other gifts. Slaves were allowed to pretend they were in charge for that one day. And for that one day, it's evil again.
- [20:09]
Max Williams
Obviously, slavery is the most evil of all, but, I mean, that is just kind of.
- [20:12]
Ben Bowlin
That's even worse. That's very like, get out. And thank you for beeping me, Max. There was a fake king. The guy called the. In English, we would call it Lord of Misrule. Eventually. Yeah, yeah, we had some of those.
- [20:30]
Max Williams
Here in the States.
- [20:33]
Ben Bowlin
Eventually, around the 4th century CE, what we call Saturnalia turned into celebration of the new year on January 1st. And a lot of the Saturnalia traditions and sort of ornaments or affectations are incorporated in the modern observance of Christmas. Please check out our episodes on Christmas. I just love this point that almost every culture across the planet has some kind of festival in the first months of the year to celebrate the fact that spring is coming. And if you talk with our boffins, our anthropologist friends, they'll tell you these are called renewal festivals.
- [21:26]
Max Williams
That's interesting, the idea of renewal by being a little silly Billy, you know, renewing yourself. It's also, you know, I wish that there were an official calendar day for Opposite Day. You know, people always talk about its opposite day, but it seems to only be used to kind of suit whatever little gag they're playing at that particular moment. It's sort of like a momentary. Yeah, it's like a momentary April Fools. Yeah. And I mean, just to reiterate, like, this is very much a day. This is a day where up is down and down is up. And, you know, the. The master becomes the servant and vice versa. Again, sort of an opposite day situation. And the idea that for that one day, you know, like the idea of being king for a day, but it doesn't really change anything, which is, I think, the part that gives it that sort of dark sort of twist. Right.
- [22:15]
Ben Bowlin
It's like an escape hatch. And I love. I mentioned Whitest Kids, you know. Do you remember that sketch?
- [22:22]
Max Williams
Of course I do, very much. And the guy went on to. One of the members went on to make Barbarian, which is a film that I quite loved. And RIP. Trevor Moore, who was the kind of the leader of that sketch group and passed Away well before his time in the last handful of years.
- [22:38]
Ben Bowlin
They have a fantastic Opposite Day sketch.
- [22:42]
Max Williams
I don't know that one.
- [22:44]
Ben Bowlin
That. Address it, please, everyone, look it up. It addresses the idea of scheduling an opposite day or the sort of cognitive paradox which is what these sorts of holidays or celebrations or festivals, whatever you want to call them, are ultimately celebrating. At its very best, the modern April Fool's Day can be pretty fun. But here's the thing. No one really knows where it came from. People weren't even asking about the provenance of April fools until maybe 1708. There's a guy who wrote into a British magazine called Apollo and said, whence proceeds the custom of making April Fools? So, like, no one knows, but there are a ton of fascinating theories.
- [23:38]
Max Williams
Yeah. A lot of scholars believe that the modern equivalent of April Fools began back there in France with that whole find the fish situation or pin the tail on the fish or the young fish, whatever it was. And you will often hear this. The idea of April Fools originating because of some as often as the case Ben, with calendar flip floppery. Right. Like certain whims of certain kings and arguments over when actual facts. Lauren Vogelbaum. New Year officially starts.
- [24:08]
Ben Bowlin
Oh, man. Yeah. This is the thing. All right. So it's. Let's rewind if we can, Max. Perfect. Thank you, Noel. Actually, yeah, I like the way you did it.
- [24:25]
Max Williams
Combine our forces for the rewind.
- [24:26]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. Back in the 1500s, there's this guy, he's the king. His name is Charles 9ix, if you're fancy. And he said, look, the new year is not going to begin on Easter anymore. For a lot of Christians at the time, the new year began on Easter. He said, instead, we're taking it to January 1st. And the idea, the theory that you'll often hear is that French people who didn't get the communication, they didn't get the memo.
- [25:01]
Max Williams
They also sort of have a way of doing things, you know, they like to do things a different there. In France, we say that they may well have gotten the memo and put it in the trash.
- [25:11]
Ben Bowlin
You know, like, we're guys who are not Francophones, but we are Francophiles, you know, Oh, I love the fridge.
- [25:18]
Max Williams
If I'm poking a little fun at the French, it's. It's absolutely ingest. I'm a huge fan.
- [25:23]
Ben Bowlin
The food is genuinely better.
- [25:25]
Max Williams
Yeah. And some of my favorite music in the entire world comes from France. But, yeah, to your point, Ben, the idea that they kind of stayed the course and kept things going as they were. So during the last week of March through April 1, that became a time to kind of make fun of the French because they had not changed their calendars to join the rest of. Which is a term you have in here, Ben, which I love. Christendom. It just seems very Robin Hood. I don't know why Christendom. It's very, very official sounding.
- [25:53]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. Like the folks who didn't get the Decree of the King and were still celebrating the quote, unquote wrong beginning of the year, they were called the April Fools. That's a theory. That's the long story short. But that doesn't always give us the answer. So the long story long, the straight seahorse teeth, the hot cheese. Is this like you were saying, Noel, we got to look at the history of calendar reform. So the Julian calendar is named after Julius Caesar. Right. And that's the calendar that made January 1st the first day of the year. But as Christianity further expands, and I would argue franchises throughout Europe, people wanted to move New Year's Day to dates that were more important to Christianity. Like, why can't it start at Christmas? Why can't the year start at Easter? And so some countries kept using January 1, and they justified it. This is so crazy. Fellow substitute teachers in the crowd, please recognize this may not be appropriate for your class. Some countries used to keep with January 1st, and they would justify it to Christendom, as. I don't know how else to say it. They would say that January 1st was the date that Jesus Christ was circumcised.
- [27:38]
Max Williams
You know, I've never really given much thought to whether or not Jesus was circumcised, but he was a Jew, and that is a custom. And I guess I didn't realize that that was a thing. Wow. Okay.
- [27:49]
Ben Bowlin
It's just like. It's a long walk as far as justifications go. Yeah. All right.
- [27:59]
Max Williams
Now, I'm speculating as to the size of Jesus's circumcised.
- [28:04]
Ben Bowlin
You're thinking about Willem Dafoe. Yeah.
- [28:06]
Max Williams
Yeah. Well, God, no. When am I not Jesus? Massive.
- [28:11]
Ben Bowlin
So look, what we're telling you folks, is by the 1500 CE, the European calendar was a real messy bowl of spaghetti. The errors in the Julian calendar, simple mathematical errors, had caused what we call the solar year to increasingly divide from the calendar year and add to this, different countries are beginning the year on different dates. This is really confusing, especially because in France, people are using Easter as the beginning of the year, primarily for bureaucratic purposes. Purposes. But people on the ground are using January 1st as the traditional Start of the year, this is when you celebrate. This is when you give each other gifts, visit your relatives, have a hug. Starting the new year on Easter is stupid inconvenient.
- [29:16]
Max Williams
So in the early 16th century, in French books, you'll find both forms of the dating system listed side by side for titles published in January, February, or March. And then moving into the mid 16th century, you started to see a system of calendaring where everything started on January 1st. And that began to be widely adopted in France. So they finally either got the memo or decided to pull it out of the trash and, you know, kind of joined the. Joined the party.
- [29:46]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. Was our buddy Charlie king Charles in 9th of his name. He created this thing on December 22, 1564, or that's when French parliament approved of the move to make January 1st the official, actual facts. Shout out, Lauren. First day of the year. This was, in my mind, this is like the calendrical version of legalizing cannabis. He looked at it, he said, everybody's already doing it, so why are we going to make it illegal?
- [30:22]
Max Williams
Wait, isn't that. That's the name of an album. Everybody else is doing it, so why shouldn't we? It's like the Cranberries, I want to say. Anyway, 18 years later, in 1582, we've got Pope Gregory issuing a papal poll, which sounds so intense, which is basically just a decree from the Pope that declared sweeping calendar reform across all of Christendom or Catholicism. The Gregorian reform included moving the start of the year to January 1st and creating a leap year system that Max very deftly stuck to with our publishing schedule and whatever leap year that was, which at the time eliminated 10 days from the month of October of 1852 in order to correct that calendar drift, which is something that I still have a hard time wrapping my head around. I think that was a big theme of the leap year episode, was me banging my head against the wall about why, what is this calendar drift.
- [31:13]
Ben Bowlin
So the Pope has no real power to make the governments of the time comply. Right. But he does say, hey, guys, if you're a Christian nation, I'm the Pope, and this is the time of really brutal monarchies. France accepts this reform. They had already changed it. A lot of people get this part wrong. Anyway, it becomes clear the more you look into it, the calendar change hypothesis has a really convenient to it. Right. It sounds like a light switch going on and off. This is not quite the truth. You can say that. Look, you can say that the calendar change hypothesis is plausible if it's Applied to Britain, maybe because they did New Year's Day on March 25 because of the feast of Annunciation. Again, trying to align the solar calendar, the passage of the actual planets, with religious ideology. The earliest version of the calendar change hypothesis that we can find in print goes back to 17, and it's a response to a discourse that only started in 1708. People weren't really asking about April Fools until centuries after it was happening.
- [32:52]
Jeremy Scott
Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley season one.
- [32:59]
Max Williams
I just knew him as a kid, kid.
- [33:01]
Jeremy Scott
Long silent voices from his past came.
- [33:04]
Ben Bowlin
Forward and he was just staring at me.
- [33:07]
Jeremy Scott
And they had secrets of their own to share.
- [33:11]
Gilbert King
Gilbert King I'm the son of Jeremy Lynn Scott.
- [33:17]
Jeremy Scott
I was no longer just telling the story. I was part of it.
- [33:21]
Gilbert King
Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.
- [33:25]
Jeremy Scott
I was because becoming the bridge between a killer and the son he'd never known.
- [33:30]
Gilbert King
If the cops and everything would have done their job properly, my dad would have been in jail. I would have never existed.
- [33:35]
Jeremy Scott
I never expected to find myself in this place. Now I need to tell you how I got here.
- [33:42]
Gilbert King
At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.
- [33:45]
Jeremy Scott
Bone Valley Season 2 Jeremy.
- [33:49]
Max Williams
Jeremy, I want to tell you something.
- [33:51]
Jeremy Scott
Listen. Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2, starting April 9 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear the entire new season ad free with exclusive content starting April 9th. Subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
- [34:13]
Ben Bowlin
We want to go to a quote from a correspondent to something called the Gentleman's Magazine. It's a little bit of a long quote. I think it's an opportunity to do a pretty cool voice. So, Noel, if you can do the first part, I'll come in at the end.
- [34:35]
Max Williams
Absolutely. The strange custom prevalent throughout this kingdom of people making fools of one another upon the 1st of April. I'm sorry, I'm doing it like Canterbury Tales stuff. Arose from the year formerly a beginning as to some purpose and in some respects on 25 March, which was supposed to be the incarnation of our Lord.
- [35:03]
Ben Bowlin
It being customary with the Romans as well as with us to hold a festival attended by an octave at the commencement of a new year, which festival lasted for eight days, whereof the first, the last was a principal. Therefore the 1st of April trill is the octave of the 25th of March and consequently the close or ending of the feast, which was both the festival of the annunciation and the beginning of the new year.
- [35:36]
Max Williams
Bravo and tally ho, good sir. Yeah, we're going to have to unpack all that. I kind of got lost in the sauce of the voices there.
- [35:43]
Noel Brown
Can I jump in real quick and talk about the voices? Because believe me, this is going to go full circle. But you guys can both use your Canterbury Tales voices. I used, if you remember from that episode, I used an accent that came up off the top of my head. At least I thought so.
- [35:56]
Max Williams
Oh, yeah, we forced you to play.
- [35:58]
Noel Brown
I figured out later when I was editing it, the accent I was doing was the one of my friend named Jeff. He talks like this all the time. Like this reason I bring this up is Jeff, who is a character. I love him to death, but he's a character. His birthday is April Fool's Day, and he's the type of guy who would lie and say his birthdays today. So he's showing many times.
- [36:18]
Ben Bowlin
Classic Jeff. Text him. Text him now. So, all right, there's another part here. We had writers back then. We would have historical precedent. There's a whole thing, a whole discourse with Chaucer scholars arguing about whether or not he actually references April Fools. And when March happens versus May versus April. We know that Chaucer wrote some pretty saucy stuff. He's a pretty smart guy. We're actually big fans of his work. Can't wait for him to conclude the Canterbury Tales. When do you think it's coming out? When do you think we'll finish it?
- [37:02]
Max Williams
I think it's been in turnaround at Sony for a while. Hopefully you'll see the light of day.
- [37:06]
Ben Bowlin
It's in production. Limbo. Oh, my God. I love you for that one. Also, if the holiday was always around, why doesn't Shakespeare mention it? Look, the United Kingdom only changed their calendar year to start on January 1st. They only did that in 1752, just like a few decades before the United States became a country. By that time, April Fools is already well established. So confusion about a changing calendar could not have been logically responsible for the origin of the celebration in Britain. Oh, also, we should mention it is possible, like our earlier guy noted that the festival held on April 1st in that correspondence with the gentleman's magazine. Is. Is it's possible.
- [38:05]
Max Williams
Read it for the article.
- [38:07]
Ben Bowlin
Sure. I love it. Oh, I. I forgot to tell you guys, one of my favorite. You know, I'm into weird food. One of my favorite weird things that I found recently. It's an actual thing have you ever heard of gentleman's relish?
- [38:22]
Max Williams
No. It doesn't sound good. That sounds really gross.
- [38:25]
Ben Bowlin
It's British. It's obviously British.
- [38:27]
Max Williams
Oh, geez. I just immediately got it. I mean, it's probably my own own fault for having a mind in the gutter, but gentleman's relish does not sound good to me.
- [38:35]
Ben Bowlin
It does sound like a euphemism. It is not a euphemism. I've got to buy some. We got to try it out.
- [38:42]
Max Williams
My mom used to make a thing called gentleman's salad that was like a gelatin salad, usually green of color and with, like, in it that didn't belong. Like, horseradish and stuff like lime jello base. And gentleman's salad is what she always called. Called it.
- [38:58]
Ben Bowlin
Did you like it?
- [38:59]
Max Williams
No, I wouldn't even eat it. No, it was like, she'd put it at everyone's place for, like, holiday meals, and I was like, hell, no.
- [39:05]
Ben Bowlin
Oh, it was a holiday thing. So everybody gets a pass. Gentleman's relish is a real thing. It's also called patum paparium. It has nothing to do with April Fool's Day, but if you have tried it, please let us know on ridiculous Histories.
- [39:22]
Max Williams
Well, surely there's a place for it in our History of Condiments ongoing series.
- [39:28]
Ben Bowlin
Ooh, yes. Okay. Another theory. Oh, man. If I get it, are you guys gonna try it with me?
- [39:35]
Max Williams
No.
- [39:37]
Ben Bowlin
You didn't even read about it.
- [39:38]
Max Williams
I don't care. It just sounds. I don't like it. I don't like the way it sounds. I want nothing to do with it. I resent its very existence.
- [39:45]
Noel Brown
I'm just. Say something right here. And it's the only time in my entire life I've been able to say this for a good thing. Sorry, Ben, I can't. Try it. Condition.
- [39:53]
Ben Bowlin
Okay. All right. All right, Max. We respect the condition. So other people will tell you. Maybe the timing of April Fool's Day is related to what we call the vernal equinox, March 21, because the weather would shift. And for previous civilizations, that was a real plot twist. But the thing is, because none of the theories about the origin of April Fool's Day have been proven to be correct, it was almost certainly a continuation of this ancient prankish tendency. It spread throughout other countries. People genuinely did not ask about its provenance until well after it was already established, the actual answer is that no one knows why it's a thing. It's ridiculous. It's not like a bank holiday. It's just this need to prank people.
- [41:00]
Max Williams
Which I mean, to be fair, you don't need a particular day to do that. A good natured prank is welcome or not unwelcome on any day of the calendar year. There are even TV shows devoted to this stuff. Remember punk'd Ashton Kutcher's seminal early 2000s reality show wherein he would. Yeah, gentleman's relish indeed. Wherein he would punk folks. Celebs usually. And now I think there's a show on TV called Practical Jokers that's very, very popular.
- [41:28]
Ben Bowlin
The kids I love Nathan for you.
- [41:30]
Max Williams
Nathan for you. Yeah, I guess you could call it a prank. I mean that's. It's like an earnest prank show where he's like pranking people by trying to help them in the most ridiculous ways possible. But I think you're spot on, Ben.
- [41:41]
Ben Bowlin
Which is what we're doing, right, Noel?
- [41:43]
Max Williams
I'd like to think so.
- [41:45]
Ben Bowlin
We're prophecy one thing. Think folks, we are foolish all year round. As Noel said, it doesn't have to be a day in April. You can be silly any old time. We have notable examples. That's the best way to end this. In this episode that we are running late on. Noel, what are some notable examples of your favorite April Fool's Day? April Fool's Day pranks?
- [42:16]
Max Williams
Well, it's also something that like, you know, corporations get in on. Get in on the phone, you know, especially in the age of. Of social media. One that I saw that made me think of you, Ben, was the. This article that seemed very, you know, very well photoshopped, I guess that Waffle House was removing waffles from its menu.
- [42:33]
Ben Bowlin
No.
- [42:34]
Max Williams
Yeah. And I think that IHOP did a thing in. In April Fool's days past where they said they were changing their name to the International House of Burgers.
- [42:43]
Ben Bowlin
Oh, that's right. I remember that one. That was not too long ago, Right?
- [42:47]
Max Williams
Ihob. Yeah. You got another one that you found, Ben, about another. What is it? A Yum Brands product. Taco Bell. Yes.
- [42:57]
Ben Bowlin
In 1996, Taco Bell said, hey, we've purchased the Liberty Bell. We've renamed it the Taco Liberty Bell and we're doing this to help with the crushing debt of the United States.
- [43:14]
Max Williams
Good on you, Taco Bell. Thanks for that.
- [43:16]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah. This didn't go over well. A lot of people. Yeah, it upset a lot of people. NPR reported it and then they had to have a press conference to just clear the air and let everybody know that the city of, of Philadelphia still owns the Liberty Bell.
- [43:37]
Max Williams
Thank God for that. Another one that you found, Ben, was in 1992, NPR did a fun little prank declaring that Richard Nixon, of course, the shamed or disgraced president who resigned in 1974 after the Watergate scandal where he was doing all kinds of naughty, underhanded things, was entering that year's presidential race and that he had a fun new slogan that he was rocking. You know, not. I mean, do the voice.
- [44:04]
Ben Bowlin
You gotta do the voice.
- [44:05]
Max Williams
Well, of course, I am not a crook. I. Some of that, right? I never did anything wrong and I won't do it again.
- [44:15]
Ben Bowlin
Love it. Thank you for doing that. So we've got the skinny on this. There's an active mystery regarding the origins of April Fool's Day. We can't thank you enough for tuning in, fellow ridiculous historians, but we will endeavor to do so this way, Max, if I could get some fanfare. Thanks for tuning in. Huzzah, huzzah. Thanks to our super producer, Mr. Max Williams. Thanks to, oh, gosh, let's see. AJ Bahamas Jacobs. Who else watched?
- [44:55]
Max Williams
Oh, yeah, ABJ, Jonathan Strickland, Glenn the Quizzter, and also, you know, pretty stand up guy when he's not in character. And Christopher Osiotis and Eve Jeffcoats here in spirit.
- [45:04]
Ben Bowlin
Yeah, the rude dudes. A ridiculous crime. Rachel, Big spinach. Lance, I'd like to do a thing in the credits where we thank random people or people who have passed recently. So thanks to Val Kilmer, man.
- [45:22]
Max Williams
Yeah, thanks to Val Kilmer, indeed. And I think I posted this before he passed. Or maybe it was portentous in some way, but I saw a post of a old tweet from Val Kilmer wherein he said, I once tickled Lou Reed. And at the time I really regretted it because he never spoke to me again. But now I'm glad I did it because I think he needed it.
- [45:43]
Ben Bowlin
Well, thanks to you, Lou, for your service. And thanks RIP Lou as well. RIP Lou as well. Thanks to you, Noel.
- [45:50]
Max Williams
You as well, Ben. We'll see you next time, folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
- [46:07]
Jeremy Scott
Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley season one.
- [46:15]
Gilbert King
Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.
- [46:19]
Jeremy Scott
I was becoming the bridge between Jeremy Scott and the son he'd never known.
- [46:24]
Gilbert King
At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.
- [46:27]
Jeremy Scott
Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2, starting April 9 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.