The Comeback Kid

Some people are born fighters, and oftentimes the fruits of their struggle can be enjoyed long after they are gone.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to Aaron Benky's Cabinet of Curiosity is a production
of I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. 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

(00:26):
the Cabinet of Curiosities. The toys from our childhood stay
with us long after we stopped playing with them. As adults,
we may lose track of a beloved stuffed animal or
a fun action figure, but we keep the memories. We

(00:47):
remember how safe they made us feel in a darkened bedroom,
or how much fun we had zooming them around the
house as if they were flying. And yet, no matter what,
we all grow up and leave childish things behind. But
thanks to one man's impulsive decision, we learned we don't
have to let the past slip away. Not only can
we hold onto it, but we can share it with

(01:07):
the people we love and keep that joy alive for
generations to come. Harry Colburn was born in Birmingham, England,
in seven When he was eighteen years old, he moved
to Ontario, Canada, where he studied to become a veterinarian surgeon.
Upon receiving his degree, he settled in Winnipeg, in Manitoba,
but duty would eventually call. Harry joined the military when

(01:29):
World War One became too great to ignore, and he
hopped a train to Quebec for basic training. It was
on his way to the camp when he encountered an
odd site. A hunter had killed a black bear and
taken its cub to sell at a local trading post.
Harry gave the man twenty dollars, and in exchange, he
took possession of the bear cub, which he named Winnipeg,

(01:49):
after the town where he'd been living. His plan was
to raise Winnipeg for a little while before releasing her
back into the forest. Unfortunately, Harry's plans changed very quickly.
Winnipeg became a hit among the other troops. They played
with her and let her stay in the bunks, where
she slept under Harry's cott. As she grew, however, Winnipeg

(02:09):
got too big to live indoors and was relegated to outside,
like a kind of watch bear for the soldiers. The
more time they spent together, the harder it became for
Harry to let go. He in Winnipeg had grown close,
so close that when he was ordered to go back
to England to fight on the Western Front, he refused
to release the bear back into the wild. He instead

(02:30):
snuck her into the ship with the other troops. Together,
they traveled to the second Canadian Infantry Brigade camp near
Stonehenge in England. Harry let her roam free for a
while while they were there. She enjoyed playing among the
large stones, but he soon understood that he would have
to give her up. There was just no way for
Winnipeg to go all the way with him to the
front lines, so he reached out to the London Zoo,

(02:52):
who agreed to watch her while he was away. Whenever
Harry found himself on leave, though, he made sure to
stop by the zoo and say hello to the bear
that had kept him company during training. At the end
of the war, Harry Colburn returned to the zoo, only
to see that a lot had changed while he was gone.
For one, Winnipeg was a star attraction by then. She

(03:13):
brought joy to so many guests, especially the children, and
so instead of taking her back to Canada, he chose
instead to leave her there at the zoo. In nineteen
Winnipeg the bear became a permanent fixture at the London Zoo.
A few years later, a young boy named Christopher with
his father Alan, visited Winnipeg the bear. Allen had started

(03:33):
out as a writer before enlisting to fight in World
War One. When Christopher turned one years old, his father
gifted him with a teddy bear that became like a
best friend to the child, not unlike the relationship between
Winnipeg and Harry. Ellen went on to write some detective
stories and mystery novels over the years, but at the
urging of his son, he eventually turned to writing children's books.

(03:54):
Christopher insisted that his father write about the stuffed toys
that he played with daily. There was a donkey, a
mother kangaroo and her baby, a bouncing orange tiger, and
a small pink piglet Alan squeeze them all in, along
with the character of a young boy he named after
his son, Christopher Robin Milne. Of course, the author couldn't
forget about the most important character of all, the teddy bear,

(04:17):
Christopher had named after the Canadian black bear at the
London Zoo, Winnie Allen. Alexander Milne didn't know it at
the time, but his stories about Winnie the Pooh, Tiger Piglets,
and the other residents of the Hundred Acre Woods would
become some of the most beloved characters in all of
children's literature, and it was all thanks to one cunning

(04:38):
soldier and his pet bear. The Olympic Games are demonstrations
of athletic greatness. Medals are awarded to individuals who test

(04:59):
their dal against some of the best athletes in the world.
What we tend to forget, though, is that the Olympics
are also about overcoming adversity. Track and field star Wilma
Rudolph won three gold medals at the nineteen sixty Olympics
in Rome, but she had to fight hard to get there.
But she was five years old. Rudolph was diagnosed with
polio and was forced to wear a leg brace for
several years. Seventy year old Hiroshi Hokuetsu from Japan competed

(05:23):
in individual dressage at the two thousand twelve Olympics. He
was up against much younger competitors, but Roshi might not
have won a medal, but he showed that age is
just a number when it comes to being good. It's
something you love, but Elizabeth Robinson might have them all beat. Elizabeth,
or Betty as she was known, was born in Riverdale, Illinois,

(05:43):
back in nineteen eleven, and from a young age, Betty
had no problem proving herself as a runner. She attended
Thornton Township High School, which was a short train ride
away from her home. One morning, the sixteen year old
junior left her home to catch the train, only to
realize that she was running eight. She had to act
quickly or risk missing it and being late for school.

(06:04):
Betty bolted towards the station. Meanwhile, one of her teachers,
a man named Charles Price, was also waiting for the train.
He caught sight of Betty running toward him as it
pulled into the stop. Price turned away and boarded. The
doors closed, and assuming that she hadn't been fast enough
to catch it, he found a seat and settled in.
A Few seconds later, Price watched as Betty took the

(06:25):
seat right next to him. The teacher also happened to
be the coach for the boys track team at the school,
and he suggested that Betty runs some sprints in the
halls while he timed her. The school didn't have a
girl's track team, and honestly, Betty didn't even know such
a thing existed. But that didn't stop Price from training her,
and it didn't stop Betty from pushing herself harder and harder.

(06:47):
Her parents, used to seeing her with a guitar in
her hand or on stage at a school play, began
watching her race instead. They cheered her on as she
competed in regional races before moving on to Olympic trials
in Chicago and New Jersey. After four months of training
and only a few meets under her belt, Betty earned
a spot at the nineteen U S Olympic team. She

(07:09):
traveled to Amsterdam, where she competed in the first ever
women's hundred meter race. Betty narrowly beat out the Canadian
challenger and took home the gold that only sixteen years old,
she achieved two things that day. Betty had become the
first woman to win a gold medal for the hundred
meter race, and she set a world record by doing
it in twelve point two seconds. After graduating from high school,

(07:31):
Betty attended Northwestern and she started preparing for the next
Olympic Games. However, in ninety one, her life took a
literal nose dive. Her cousin, a skilled pilot, had invited
Betty to join him for a ride in his plane.
As they were cruising above Chicago, the engine stalled and
the plane plummeted back toward earth. The cousin's legs were

(07:51):
broken in multiple places, but he survived. Betty fared much worse.
Her body was discovered by a passer by who assumed
that she was too far gone to be saved. One
of her legs and her left arm were twisted, having
been broken in several places. She also had a massive
wound over her right eye, and she wasn't moving. A
good samaritan picked her up and placed her in the

(08:13):
trunk of his car before taking her to the local
undertaker that he knew. But when this undertaker got her
on the table, he noticed something strange. She was breathing.
Doctors worked tirelessly to save her, putting a rod and
pin into her leg before encasing it in a cast
running from the top of her foot all the way
to her hip. Nobody thought that she would ever walk again,

(08:35):
and running seemed to be out of the question. Six
months after the accident, Betty was finally able to lift
herself out of her wheelchair. With her brother in law's help,
she went from a few steps here and there to
walking around her neighborhood. Walking led to running, and before
she knew it, Betty was training again. Five years passed,
but by six Betty was finally ready to compete again. Unfortunate,

(09:00):
her injuries had left her unable to bend her knee
and assume the starting crouch for the hundred meter race. Instead,
she entered the four by one relay with three other women.
They were up against the Germans, who had been favored
to win. The race got off to a rocky start,
with the Germans coming out strong. Betty was slotted as
the third runner of the race. As she ran toward

(09:21):
her teammate to pass her the baton, the German competitor
dropped their's, giving Betty's teammate and opening to steal the lead,
which she did. It took five years, a broken leg,
and a lot of rehabilitation, but Betty Robinson had earned
her second gold medal. She had it merely overcome adversity,
though she had cheated the very powers of death and one.

(09:48):
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 Curiosities podcast dot com.
The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership
with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,

(10:11):
and you can learn all about it over at the
World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,