January 30, 2025 • 10 mins
Things that were covered and hidden become revealed on today's tour.
Order the official Cabinet of Curiosities book by clicking here today, and get ready to enjoy some curious reading!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
iHeartRadio and Grimm 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 the Cabinet of Curiosities.
(00:36):
Wander around Florence, Italy, birthplace of the Renaissance, and you're
bound to find priceless works of art everywhere you look.
For the past eight hundred years, Florentine museums have been
collecting and displaying some of the greatest pieces of Western
art in the world. But after all this time, new
works are still being discovered. In nineteen seventy five, for example,
(00:56):
a worker was busy in the bowels of the Medici
Chapel clean out a coal storage room. As he stripped
away decades of old plaster, he was surprised to find
something hiding underneath a human figure sketched in charcoal. Had
another handyman whiled away his lunch hour doodling on the
walls one hundred years before, or was something amazing hiding
beneath this plaster? When the worker brought the director of
(01:19):
the chapel down to sea. This director realized those little
doodles were something very special. After more workers carefully removed
the overlay of plaster, the chapel director was certain that
he had found something important. Dozens of charcoal and chalk
sketches of faces, torsos, and legs decorated the walls. One
set of legs seemed very familiar. In fact, it looked
(01:41):
a whole lot like a pair that belonged to his
statue in the museum. Above them a mausoleum completely designed,
built and sculpted by Michelangelo. Michael Angelo, of course, was
one of the four teenage mutant Ninja turtles. Wait no,
that's not right. He was one of Florence's most famous artists.
His colossal statue of David still draws tourists to the
(02:02):
city today. His talent was so great that he was
even asked to paint the Assistine Chapel at the Vatican.
So why were his sketches hiding in an underground coal pit.
The answer lies at the intersection of art and politics.
Michelangelo was a famous and influential figure during his time.
He had power in the city states of Rome, Venice
(02:23):
and Florence, and even at times had the ear of
the Pope, which meant that to certain people, like the
Medici family of Florence, Michelangelo was dangerous. The Medici were
a noble family in Florence who ran the wealthiest bank
in the region. Their vast holdings made them incredibly powerful
in Florence and gave them influence over the Vatican. With
(02:44):
so much money to burn, they helped fund the Renaissance
by commissioning work from artists. During the first few years
of Michelangelo's career, the Medicis were good friends and patrons.
Beginning in fourteen eighty nine, when Michelangelo was just a
fourteen year old apprentice, he was taken in by the
Mediici court and supported as an artist. He painted, sculpted,
(03:05):
and designed many works for them over the years, but
in fifteen twenty seven their relationship abruptly soured. That year,
Florence citizens ousted the Medicies as rulers of the city
state and declared it a true republic. The medichiese countered
by raising an army to lay siege to the city. Michelangelo,
a native Florentine, immediately jumped into action to help the
(03:27):
city that he loved. As a seasoned architect and designer,
he helped design the city's siege fortifications to hold off
advancing armies, and for two years he helped support Florence.
But when the city fell to the Medichi forces in
fifteen thirty, the Mediiciese were not exactly happy to see
their old artist friend. Pope Clement, who also happened to
be a member of the Medici family, swore out a
(03:50):
warrant for Michelangelo's execution. The Pope, the mouth of the
Catholic Church itself, wanted Michelangelo dead, so the great sculptor
went into hype. For two whole months, Michelangelo hid right
under the Medicies's nose in a tiny storage room below
the Medichi chapels. The only light in his hiding place
was from a tiny window, and yet even under pain
(04:12):
of death, Michelangelo just couldn't put the charcoal down. He
spent his voluntary imprisonment sketching ideas for his new projects.
He expected that soon enough Pope Clement would realize the
pickle he had put himself in. Sure Michelangelo had supported
the ousting of the Mediciese, but he was simply too
talented to kill, and just as predicted, Michelangelo was pardoned
(04:35):
a few months later. The Pope had a new project
for him too, the Last Judgment, a vast fresco to
adorn the wall of the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo's time in
hiding was soon forgotten. He continued to work for the
Mediciese and other patrons until his death in fifteen sixty four,
and he left behind hundreds of breathtaking paintings, sculptures and buildings,
(04:58):
but perhaps his most human works or a handful of
doodles that he drew on the wall wondering if he
would ever be free again. Mass crime fighters are a
(05:20):
part of American pop culture, maybe even the most iconic part.
Marvel and DC heroes like Batman, Superman, Spider Man, and
Captain America have been appearing in comics, movies, TV shows,
and on shirts, lunchboxes, and backpacks for almost one hundred years.
Those heroes have their roots in the pulp adventure novels
of the early twentieth century, stories about characters such as
(05:43):
Zoro and John Carter of Mars, and in turn, those
characters were inspired by Wild West full heroes of the
nineteenth century. So while today superheroes seem like fantasy men
in masks, fighting crime was a very real phenomenon in
the Old West. Only the real life masked men were
a lot more complicated than their fictional counterparts, and their
(06:03):
secret identities were often just as strange as their masked personas.
Nathaniel En Kinney was a striking figure even when he
wasn't preaching from the pulpit. He stood at six feet
and weighed between two hundred and fifty and three hundred pounds.
His fiery sermons matched his imposing stature. He would preach
with his Bible in front of him on a podium
(06:24):
and his two pistols lying on either side. Kinny believed
in evangelical morality, a fairly strict interpretation of Christian belief.
No drinking, no smoking, no partying, no womanizing, and certainly
no criminal behavior of any kind. He was in the
wrong place for such beliefs. Nathaniel Kinney brought his family
to the Ozarks in eighteen eighty three. The Ozarks, by
(06:46):
the way, are a mountainous region in southern Missouri and
northern Arkansas and in the post Civil War period, the
Ozarks were especially lawless. You see, many of the Southern
states struggled with law and order in the wake of
the Confederacy's law, and Missouri was always incredibly politically divided,
never entirely a Confederate or a Union state. As such,
(07:07):
pro Union and pro Confederate neighbors often clashed. Nathaniel Kinney,
a Union veteran, grew tired of criminals of all kinds.
There were dozens of murders in his county, and the
culprits often went free by bribing local judges, and so
Nathaniel decided to take action. He gathered over a dozen
of his local friends and had them meet him at
(07:28):
the site of a recent murder. He gave a speech
over the body of the murder victim, saying that it
was he and his fellow citizen's duty to uphold the law,
even if those in power chose not to. So they
formed their own crime fighting society, calling themselves the Bald Nobbers.
Not the most intimidating name, but it had meaning behind it.
A bald knob is a hill. It refers to the
(07:50):
mountainous terrain of the Ozarks, so a bald knobber was
essentially someone who traveled over those hills. However arduous they
might be, the bald and craft through their own masks.
They used flower sacks, so again not quite as intimidating
as Batman, but they worked with what they had, and
one day outlaw brothers Frank and Tuball Taylor, got into
(08:11):
an argument with a local shopkeeper, John Dickerson. They shot
up the store and even wounded John. The brothers were
then arrested, but were related to a local judge, so
the bald Nobbers knew that the outlaws would be out
on bail soon, and they couldn't quite stomach the thought
of that. So the Bald Noobbers donned their masks and
rode out into the night, arriving at the jail where
(08:32):
the Taylor brothers were being held, They dragged them from
their cells, beat them, and then hanged them. And you
can see why modern superheroes don't kill, because it makes
for a less gruesome story. As time went by, legend
of Nathaniel spread, preacher by day, masked crime fighter by night.
The ranks of the Bald Noobbers grew, until eventually there
were a thousand of them. But as you can imagine,
(08:54):
all that power soon went to Nathaniel's head. He was
the only one who could judge if a person deserved
to live or die, to judge if they were pure
and moral like him. Before long, the Bald Nobbers became
just another outlaw gang, using their influence to kill indiscriminately
and even bribe officials when it suited them. They had
become the very thing that they were fighting against. In
(09:16):
eighteen eighty eight, after years of Nathaniel terrorizing the Ozarks,
a rival gang member finally shot and killed him. But
the legend of the Bald Nobbers lives on, so much
so that there's even a theme park ride in the
modern day Ozarks dedicated to the gang, as well as
a popular stage play. The story of the Bald Nobbers
shows us what a dangerous concept mass crime fighting is
(09:39):
in real life, but it also shows that when a
society fails to protect its citizens, they have no choice
left but to stand up for themselves. However, as Spider
Man creator Stan Lee taught us, with great power comes
great responsibility. Any modern day massed crime fighter would do
well to remember this and to perhaps choose a less
(09:59):
curious then a sack a flower. 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 Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.
(10:21):
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 the Worldoflore dot com.
And until next time, stay curious.
Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
iHeartRadio and Grimm 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 the Cabinet of Curiosities.
(00:36):
Wander around Florence, Italy, birthplace of the Renaissance, and you're
bound to find priceless works of art everywhere you look.
For the past eight hundred years, Florentine museums have been
collecting and displaying some of the greatest pieces of Western
art in the world. But after all this time, new
works are still being discovered. In nineteen seventy five, for example,
(00:56):
a worker was busy in the bowels of the Medici
Chapel clean out a coal storage room. As he stripped
away decades of old plaster, he was surprised to find
something hiding underneath a human figure sketched in charcoal. Had
another handyman whiled away his lunch hour doodling on the
walls one hundred years before, or was something amazing hiding
beneath this plaster? When the worker brought the director of
(01:19):
the chapel down to sea. This director realized those little
doodles were something very special. After more workers carefully removed
the overlay of plaster, the chapel director was certain that
he had found something important. Dozens of charcoal and chalk
sketches of faces, torsos, and legs decorated the walls. One
set of legs seemed very familiar. In fact, it looked
(01:41):
a whole lot like a pair that belonged to his
statue in the museum. Above them a mausoleum completely designed,
built and sculpted by Michelangelo. Michael Angelo, of course, was
one of the four teenage mutant Ninja turtles. Wait no,
that's not right. He was one of Florence's most famous artists.
His colossal statue of David still draws tourists to the
(02:02):
city today. His talent was so great that he was
even asked to paint the Assistine Chapel at the Vatican.
So why were his sketches hiding in an underground coal pit.
The answer lies at the intersection of art and politics.
Michelangelo was a famous and influential figure during his time.
He had power in the city states of Rome, Venice
(02:23):
and Florence, and even at times had the ear of
the Pope, which meant that to certain people, like the
Medici family of Florence, Michelangelo was dangerous. The Medici were
a noble family in Florence who ran the wealthiest bank
in the region. Their vast holdings made them incredibly powerful
in Florence and gave them influence over the Vatican. With
(02:44):
so much money to burn, they helped fund the Renaissance
by commissioning work from artists. During the first few years
of Michelangelo's career, the Medicis were good friends and patrons.
Beginning in fourteen eighty nine, when Michelangelo was just a
fourteen year old apprentice, he was taken in by the
Mediici court and supported as an artist. He painted, sculpted,
(03:05):
and designed many works for them over the years, but
in fifteen twenty seven their relationship abruptly soured. That year,
Florence citizens ousted the Medicies as rulers of the city
state and declared it a true republic. The medichiese countered
by raising an army to lay siege to the city. Michelangelo,
a native Florentine, immediately jumped into action to help the
(03:27):
city that he loved. As a seasoned architect and designer,
he helped design the city's siege fortifications to hold off
advancing armies, and for two years he helped support Florence.
But when the city fell to the Medichi forces in
fifteen thirty, the Mediiciese were not exactly happy to see
their old artist friend. Pope Clement, who also happened to
be a member of the Medici family, swore out a
(03:50):
warrant for Michelangelo's execution. The Pope, the mouth of the
Catholic Church itself, wanted Michelangelo dead, so the great sculptor
went into hype. For two whole months, Michelangelo hid right
under the Medicies's nose in a tiny storage room below
the Medichi chapels. The only light in his hiding place
was from a tiny window, and yet even under pain
(04:12):
of death, Michelangelo just couldn't put the charcoal down. He
spent his voluntary imprisonment sketching ideas for his new projects.
He expected that soon enough Pope Clement would realize the
pickle he had put himself in. Sure Michelangelo had supported
the ousting of the Mediciese, but he was simply too
talented to kill, and just as predicted, Michelangelo was pardoned
(04:35):
a few months later. The Pope had a new project
for him too, the Last Judgment, a vast fresco to
adorn the wall of the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo's time in
hiding was soon forgotten. He continued to work for the
Mediciese and other patrons until his death in fifteen sixty four,
and he left behind hundreds of breathtaking paintings, sculptures and buildings,
(04:58):
but perhaps his most human works or a handful of
doodles that he drew on the wall wondering if he
would ever be free again. Mass crime fighters are a
(05:20):
part of American pop culture, maybe even the most iconic part.
Marvel and DC heroes like Batman, Superman, Spider Man, and
Captain America have been appearing in comics, movies, TV shows,
and on shirts, lunchboxes, and backpacks for almost one hundred years.
Those heroes have their roots in the pulp adventure novels
of the early twentieth century, stories about characters such as
(05:43):
Zoro and John Carter of Mars, and in turn, those
characters were inspired by Wild West full heroes of the
nineteenth century. So while today superheroes seem like fantasy men
in masks, fighting crime was a very real phenomenon in
the Old West. Only the real life masked men were
a lot more complicated than their fictional counterparts, and their
(06:03):
secret identities were often just as strange as their masked personas.
Nathaniel En Kinney was a striking figure even when he
wasn't preaching from the pulpit. He stood at six feet
and weighed between two hundred and fifty and three hundred pounds.
His fiery sermons matched his imposing stature. He would preach
with his Bible in front of him on a podium
(06:24):
and his two pistols lying on either side. Kinny believed
in evangelical morality, a fairly strict interpretation of Christian belief.
No drinking, no smoking, no partying, no womanizing, and certainly
no criminal behavior of any kind. He was in the
wrong place for such beliefs. Nathaniel Kinney brought his family
to the Ozarks in eighteen eighty three. The Ozarks, by
(06:46):
the way, are a mountainous region in southern Missouri and
northern Arkansas and in the post Civil War period, the
Ozarks were especially lawless. You see, many of the Southern
states struggled with law and order in the wake of
the Confederacy's law, and Missouri was always incredibly politically divided,
never entirely a Confederate or a Union state. As such,
(07:07):
pro Union and pro Confederate neighbors often clashed. Nathaniel Kinney,
a Union veteran, grew tired of criminals of all kinds.
There were dozens of murders in his county, and the
culprits often went free by bribing local judges, and so
Nathaniel decided to take action. He gathered over a dozen
of his local friends and had them meet him at
(07:28):
the site of a recent murder. He gave a speech
over the body of the murder victim, saying that it
was he and his fellow citizen's duty to uphold the law,
even if those in power chose not to. So they
formed their own crime fighting society, calling themselves the Bald Nobbers.
Not the most intimidating name, but it had meaning behind it.
A bald knob is a hill. It refers to the
(07:50):
mountainous terrain of the Ozarks, so a bald knobber was
essentially someone who traveled over those hills. However arduous they
might be, the bald and craft through their own masks.
They used flower sacks, so again not quite as intimidating
as Batman, but they worked with what they had, and
one day outlaw brothers Frank and Tuball Taylor, got into
(08:11):
an argument with a local shopkeeper, John Dickerson. They shot
up the store and even wounded John. The brothers were
then arrested, but were related to a local judge, so
the bald Nobbers knew that the outlaws would be out
on bail soon, and they couldn't quite stomach the thought
of that. So the Bald Noobbers donned their masks and
rode out into the night, arriving at the jail where
(08:32):
the Taylor brothers were being held, They dragged them from
their cells, beat them, and then hanged them. And you
can see why modern superheroes don't kill, because it makes
for a less gruesome story. As time went by, legend
of Nathaniel spread, preacher by day, masked crime fighter by night.
The ranks of the Bald Noobbers grew, until eventually there
were a thousand of them. But as you can imagine,
(08:54):
all that power soon went to Nathaniel's head. He was
the only one who could judge if a person deserved
to live or die, to judge if they were pure
and moral like him. Before long, the Bald Nobbers became
just another outlaw gang, using their influence to kill indiscriminately
and even bribe officials when it suited them. They had
become the very thing that they were fighting against. In
(09:16):
eighteen eighty eight, after years of Nathaniel terrorizing the Ozarks,
a rival gang member finally shot and killed him. But
the legend of the Bald Nobbers lives on, so much
so that there's even a theme park ride in the
modern day Ozarks dedicated to the gang, as well as
a popular stage play. The story of the Bald Nobbers
shows us what a dangerous concept mass crime fighting is
(09:39):
in real life, but it also shows that when a
society fails to protect its citizens, they have no choice
left but to stand up for themselves. However, as Spider
Man creator Stan Lee taught us, with great power comes
great responsibility. Any modern day massed crime fighter would do
well to remember this and to perhaps choose a less
(09:59):
curious then a sack a flower. 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 Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.
(10:21):
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 the Worldoflore dot com.
And until next time, stay curious.
Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities News
Host
Aaron Mahnke
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