August 15, 2026 • 34 mins
After the War of 1812, the US decided to shore up security at Lake Champlain by constructing a fort on Island Point. However, due to a surveying error, the US ended up building this fort in Canada, rather than the states. Listen in to learn more about the ridiculous story of Fort Montgomery, and why some people prefer to call it Fort Blunder.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
I put it. I've been putting these in. If we
just go to twenty twenty six, we'll do Fort Blunder,
and then the political body doubles. Yeah there, just go
to twenty tweets. Yeah, yeah, it's about Yeah, I could
(00:23):
do all right, Fellow Ridiculous Historians, we are back with
this week's classic episode, Everybody fondly remembers the War of
eighteen twelve.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh yeah, what a time, What a time to be alive?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
What a time. It's no eighteen eleven, but we'll keep it.
This is this is a crazy one better, it's one better.
It's what what could be better than? Eighteen eleven? Eighteen
twelve war side. This is one of our favorite kind
of genre of ridiculous history, because it's about when very
(01:06):
powerful militaries do stuff in an incredibly dumb way.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Oh boy, did they ever? I think the title says
it all.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Fort Blunder, the US fort mistakenly built in Canada.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Let's roll it to me.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(01:51):
the show, Ridiculous Historians. This episode is about a hilarious mistake,
a goof a doof a whoopsie, a blunder. My name
is Ben A blender, A blending of blunders, perhaps.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Yeah, a blending of blunders that on first blush seems
a little unremarkable. But no, sir, No, sir, was not
unremarkable because it has to do with borders. We've been
doing a little border theme lately. But we had that
war between what was it, Ohio and a mission into war.
They had that no man's land where no man knew
who it belonged to because of a poor mapping and
(02:30):
just poor what speculation right or cartography? Cartography, that's the word, Ben.
Such is the case in today's episode where the US
accidentally built a military based on the wrong side of
the US Canada border spoiler alert.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
But there's more to it than that, isn't there.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
So in eighteen sixteen it became a big deal that
we protect our border with Canada.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Why, you might ask, why is that? No, I'll tell
you why, Ben, You think we think.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Of Canada as our mellow you know, stoner neighbors to
the north.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Yeah, it's like it's one time I don't completely agree
with this. One time a friend of mine referred to
Canada as diet America, and I said, why is that
And they said, well, it's a little better for you,
and I was like, you know nothing about the diet
soda game man watching out of this analogy, Oh, we
should give a shout out to our guest super producer
Paul Mission Controlled decand.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
He's like our Canada.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
He actually he and he is our Canada. He and
super producer Casey Begram are very good friends outside of
the show. The American version of Casey.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
It's funny Casey. He has his second life in Paris,
France as LaBouche, but occasionally he carries on a third
life as a logger in French Canada also goes by
the moniker.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
LaBouche wears a slightly different outfit.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Much more of a plaid flannel lumberjack flannel situation. And yeah,
and he has an unstoppable force in the logging industry
and it.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
All ties into his Parisian criminal empire, which we should
save for its own episode. I think we should because
boundaries are important.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Speaking of boundaries, so we're talking about Canada. We think
of them as as our friends, which they are, but
at the time, I mean, there's still what what would
you call them then? A territory of the United Kingdom, Like,
how are they connected to the United Kingdom.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Well, the thing is that the British use Canadian land
as a taking off point for invasions. So during both
the American Revolutionary War and again in the War of
eighteen twelve, British forces launch invasions down Lake Champlain with
hopes of cutting America in two. And so the Madison
(04:53):
administration says, this is a weak point, this cannot be happening.
We have to do something. Rum pump, something must be done.
We need a sick fortress, we need a dope a fortress.
That's the best solution. So they construct a modern, heavy
fort modern for that day on the New York shore
(05:15):
of Lake Champlain. And they named the place Fort Montgomery,
in honor of General Richard Montgomery, a hero of the
Revolutionary War.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Yeah, and this dude named Joseph Totten, who later became
the Chief engineer of the US Army, of the whole army,
This guy meant business. He oversaw the construction and it
was a thirty foot tall structure. It was made out
of the same Vermont limestone that later was used to
construct Radio City Music Hall and the Brooklyn Bridge, and
(05:45):
they built this thing up. It was going to have
one hundred and twenty five cannon ports and any ship
that was passing by on the British side was going
to be given What.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
For sounds great on paper, here's the problem. This was
an embarrassment on multiple levels. And we'll get to the
big one in a sec. But just the building itself,
it was, as you said, eight sided, thirty feet high,
but it was built on a weak, unstable foundation that
was mainly composed of debris bought from ruins of the
(06:18):
Plattsburgh batteries and outworks. So literally, the foundations of this
thing are weak. It can't hold, and it doesn't matter
if it does hold, because they figured out what was
wrong pretty quickly.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yeah, at the most embarrassing time possible, because Madison actually
showed up to get a glance, to get a gander
at the progress that you know that he he had
proposed this fort, and that is when they realized that
they had actually built the thing on the Canada side.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Let's get a tire screech, perfect. Yeah, you see, under
the seventeen eighty th Retreaty of Paris, the border between
New York and Quebec was the forty fifth parallel, but
the previous understanding of the location of that line of
latitude was incorrect, a fact that surveyors did not discover
until eighteen eighteen. At this point, the US has already
(07:18):
spent two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars on construction.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
That has not jump change of the time had a serious,
big imaginary military money.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, let's let's inflation calculate this real quick.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Here we go.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars in eighteen eighteen
is now worth approximately five million, five hundred thirty three thousand,
five hundred nineteen dollars and sixty nine cents.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
Okay, so maybe not like Avatar money, but you know,
five million dollars five million bucks.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
First Hypto instruction.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Sure, that's a lot.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
That's a lot for a stone structure. It's true.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
There wasn't even any like moving parts. There wasn't even
any technology. Itolved probably windows, windows, sure, door hinges, that's
the original moving parts. Yes, so this is this is
a tremendous embarrassment. Right, What do they do when they
figure out that this fort designed to protect the US
from Canada, is you know in Canada. Yeah, And it
(08:26):
wasn't until eighteen forty two that this discrepancy about the
borderline was resolved. There's something called the Webster Ashburton Treaty
that provided the understanding that the original border was going
to hold the old line that was surveyed by Valentine
and Collins in seventeen seventy four that was known as
the forty fifth degree of north latitude and then became
(08:48):
known as the actual divide between New York and Vermont
on one side and the British province of Canada on
the other. And from this is a quote actually from
a neat Orama article, and from said point of intersection
west along the said divide lies as heretofore known and
understood to the Iroquois as or Sir Lawrence River.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
You know, this is back in the day when if
you wanted stuff to sound totally profound, you added, said
it just peppered and said at some point, you know
our said guest producer Paul Decant is agreeing here. So
it's interesting because they tried to resolve the issue. But
while they were resolving this, we have to remember this
(09:31):
fort had been abandoned decades. Locals are looting the construction
site because the work stopped, you know, and Fort Montgomery,
by the time eighteen forty two comes around, is widely
known as Fort Blunder. But to your point, now, after
this Webster Ashburton Treaty, that's the one, right, they resumed
(09:53):
construction in eighteen forty four, and Fort Blunder actually get
some get some play. It's a it's a working base.
You just actually me then, No, I'm just saying actually,
like I'm surprised.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Okay, that's fair.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Right, Look, it's a living language. I'll speak how I want.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
I see you and as well you should, then I
will ask questions as I want.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Do you Are you one of those people who's intimidated
by the use of the word actually or is it?
For me? It's when it's at the beginning of a sentence,
it always means that, so why are you doing this?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Yeah, it's sort of to me.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
It's a license to tune out whatever the person's about
to say after that, So I actually appreciate it. It's
kind of a context clue where you know whatever's going
to follow is going to be pretentious and unhelpful.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Like that old Dimitri Martin observation when he says I
love bumper stickers. It's such a convenient way of saying,
let's never talk agreed. Oh I like bumper stickers, They're
just not for me.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
They're not for me either.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
No, No, I have a virgin car.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
This is strange. You can see photos of Fort Blunder
or Fort Montgomery excuses. If you want to check out
some close up pictures, visit historic Lakes dot org, where
you can see you can see the lay of the land,
you can see the old map where they miscalculated everything.
You can even see a sketch about Blunder, which depicts
(11:23):
the structure we talked about earlier.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
I don't know if we talked about some of the
features of the fort outside of the gun turrets or whatever,
the little windows, but it did at one point stand
forty eight feet high. The western facing wall was known
as the Gorge, and that was adjacent to a giant
called that's something called a cover face or an earthen bank,
and that was created as a defensive aid for land attacks,
(11:47):
and then it had a moat. I didn't realize this
is I mean, it's very much like old school kind
of castle type features. Right, It had a moat which
was referred to as a wet ditch, which was filled
with lake water. These days it is not is not
looking so hot. It is quite worse for wear because
a lot of local you know, kids and ruffians and
biker gangs, you know, have just tagged it all up.
(12:11):
It is actually for sale if you're in the market.
In the nineteen twenties, the US sold Fort Montgomery at
an auction, and then in nineteen eighty three a Victor
Pod who is a shipping magnate from Montreal. That's when
he bought it, and he offered part of the property
to New York State as a historic preservation site, but
(12:31):
New York did not want it. Then Pod died in
ninety nine and his sons inherited the fort and tried
to sell it on eBay and actually got one valid
bid for five million bucks, but it fell through. Still
for sale, I believe the current asking price is around
a million bucks.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
That's a lot of depreciation, really is from five point
five to three whatever, just sixty nine.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
That's worse than like dealership depreciation, like when you drive
the car off the line, you know, one million, one million,
not even a million, nine hundred and ninety five thousand.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Ah yeah, So from five point five million dollars and
sixty nine cents to just under a million dollars, that's
boat level depreciation, and you know, hopefully a lesson learned.
There's a great Atlas Obscure article about the current situation
Fort Montgomery is encountering, which just says for sale an abandoned,
(13:29):
decaying fort on a private island. It says decaying, Uh huh,
and it is. You can see some great pictures. It's overgrown,
there's graffiti all over it. They're probably you know, syringes.
You don't think they.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
Would have gone in there and gussied it up a
little bit like they did for real estate photos. You know,
they're really not trying to upsell this thing, are they been?
Speaker 4 (13:46):
No?
Speaker 1 (13:47):
No, they're not really, because the problem here is one
of infrastructure, right, and it's still on the National Register
of Historic Place is But okay, everybody knows that it
needs to be saved, but nobody's willing to pony up
the scratch and cheddar, the itchy cheddar to support it.
(14:10):
For instance, the Preservation League of New York State included
this Fort on its Seven to Save List in two
thousand and nine, a roundup of at risk historic sites
that need help, and according to Katie Peace, the communications
director of the Preservation League of New York State, there
are no current plans to rehabilitate the site. It joins
(14:33):
the ranks of other historical places and objects of significance,
like the gunboat Spitfire, which was part of the American
fleet that contributed to the Saratoga Victory in seventeen seventy seven,
or the John van Houston House, which looks the worse
for wear, but is an early eighteenth century example of
(14:54):
Dutch settlement along the Hudson, the plum Bronson House, which
is also just rapidly deteriorating, and the Magdalen Island, which
has an ancient past as a stopping place for Native
American populations or First Nations and Europeans who came later,
the historic South Street Seaport, the Burden Iron Works Museum.
(15:18):
Those are the seven, but there are many, many more,
And when you look around, whether it's in the US
or in other countries, I'm sure there's no shortage of
decaying pieces of history that should be preserved. Like have
you ever driven through Tennessee.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
Yeah, a little bit, but not a ton. Give me
the scoop.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Tennessee is there must be some government program. I can
say this because I have family there. There must be
some government program to make sure that everybody has at
least one to two decaying barns in their fields. And
you can even see them when you just drive on
the interstate. But I'm always baffled by that, you know
what I mean, because these barns are in use, but
(15:58):
they're ready for one match to make them.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
That's very similar to driving some of the rural roads
in Georgia, like between Atlanta and Athens, for example, or
Augusta and Athens. Lots of big open fields with just
a single ramshackled barn in the middle, and it looks
like it's leaning kind of at a canted angle, like
it could fall down with just a light breath of wind.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Wiregrass country, especially if you drive. This is an example
for people who don't know how big this state is,
especially driving from Atlanta to Savannah down on Georgia's small
Atlantic coast. Have you made that drive?
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I have. It's been a minute, though it's a long one.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
It's a long one. And it's not a particularly exciting
one for some people. But it's what how long is it?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
It's hours from here to Savannah to Atlanta. I believe
it's about six hours.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Six hours. Yeah, six long hours, full of full of history,
and full of things that look the worse for where
you know. It reminds me whenever I travel somewhere, whether
for work or whether for personal reasons, I always try
(17:13):
to find a local museum or an historic site. In Texas, recently,
a super producer, Paul Michigan Control Decking and I visited
the Alamo and hey, check this out, man, I got
something for you.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Ben is now rummaging through his bag of chicks. Okay,
here you go.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
I couldn't bring you the actual Alamo, but I found
I found a little funny.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
It's a pamphlet. It's a handbill for the Alamo.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
I would say it's a femera.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, it absolutely is.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Ben, give me the rundown of the Alamo as I
perused this.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Hand So so the thing that I think startled both
Paul and myself was, and Paul, tell me if I
get this wrong, is that when we went to the
actual Alamo and went inside, it's free to attend. By
the way, everything was under restoration or construction work, and
there were there were entire pieces of of the building
(18:11):
that needed to be saved, right, Uh, that were off limits,
and we we didn't get to do a lot of
the fun stuff. There's a re enactor who will builk
you in a card game. We missed that. It was
early in the morning. Uh. But I'm a huge I'm
a huge fan of that stuff, and I and I
hope that I hope that we can as a species
(18:33):
do our best to preserve the physical traces of those
who came before us, whether that is a military fort,
a vessel of note, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
I see there's a pretty big footprint for the gift
shop here, Ben. Was it spectacular? Was it an above average
gift shop?
Speaker 4 (18:50):
It was?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
You know it was it was. Uh, it was interesting.
It's interesting. I I did not personally pick up any
if so.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
I was there.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
I was there for this story. But they have all
you know, Texas branded stuff, uh, shotglasses, astros, replica guns. No, No,
not this time. If if they were giving out actual
pieces of the Alamo, might probably pick one up, but
that would maybe defeat their purposes. But you know what,
my friend, if ever I find myself on Fort Montgomery
(19:23):
or Fort Blunder, I will pick up some pieces of
history for us.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Well, that's what we do here on Ridiculous History, man,
We pick up the pieces of history. We put them
back together like a veritable Rubik's cube.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
And this ends our episode. But not.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
It's time, gentle men.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Jonathan Strickland ak the Quisterland quiz.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
It's going to be back.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
Guys. You've got a lot of nerve, my friend.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
I sure do.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Just in general, it's just let's just let's.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
Just establish this just for a moment though, gentlemen. Uh huh,
you're in my playground now, because you're not in your
normal studio. You're in my studio. That's true, that's true.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
We are so we have a number of studios here
at h Q, and Jonathan, this is one of the
studios where you spend a lot of time recording. Uh
let's see tech stuff.
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Sure, that's right. In your studio, I record the brink.
But in my studio, I record tech stuff. Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
And you know, I gotta say, I love what you're
done with the place.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Thanks, thanks, you're enjoying my butt groove. Right now, you're
in my chair.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
I'm in your chair.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
That's the chair I sit in.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
Oh that's right. Yeah, I didn't think that. Are we cool?
Do you want to switch chairs? I'm fine with that.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
If we switch chairs, then you can see whether or
not the thing I'm about to tell you, if it's
true or false. That's right, you just I'll just stay here.
You're here for a reason. Yes, And the most cringe
worthy segment in all the podcasting where I present a
scenario to the two hosts of Ridiculous History and they
determine whether or not I made it up or if
(21:10):
it's a real one. And I understand we were talking
about things about borders and mistakes about placing things places
where you may not actually own them, so this is
a somewhat related to that. But on the other side
(21:31):
of the United States of America, the southern side. Have
you ever wondered why Florida has a panhandle that seems
to cut off the bottom of the state of Alabama all.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
The time, constantly keeps me up at night.
Speaker 4 (21:45):
Well, I have a scenario for you. You will have three
minutes to decide whether or not and in fact, it
is true or false, and of course, we always have
an arbitrary rule, and I didn't come up with one beforehand.
So if you're going to ask me a question before
you get you have to yell spring break rules and
then you can ask a question. Deal because it has
(22:06):
to do with Florida and Alabama done all right, here we go.
It's because of a really bad map and some quote
unquote surveyors. After winning or purchasing territories from England, Spain,
and France, the American government got down to the business
of establishing states in the early eighteen hundreds. Originally, the
(22:30):
Colony of Georgia stretched much further to the west, but
it was decided that part of that land would be
created into the state of Alabama. The Chattahoochee River would
serve as a border much of the state line and
would go all the way south, and a team of
cartographers determined that the Gulf Coast of what would have
(22:54):
been Alabama fell on the thirty one degree latitude. Here's
the problem. The actual latitude line for the Gulf Coast
is thirty degrees, which meant that the map actually ended
much further north than the Gulf coast. But that's how
(23:14):
it was written down, and because that's how it was
written down in official documents, that's where the end of
Alabama would be. And because of that error, Alabama does
not have a Gulf coast that stretches across its entire width. Instead,
it just has Mobile Bay. Begin Yeah, yes, mister Brown.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Well, I've got to run to the timer. It's in
the other studio. Hang on, Hey, we're good.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
All right, We'll just take about five seconds off that,
all right? But yes, rolls, yes, yes, Ms Brown.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
Is this there's anything to do with the band Florida
Georgia line?
Speaker 4 (23:52):
It certainly has not, as far as they know, and
thank the heavens, has nothing to do with that band.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Okay, rules, yes.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
Mister bullet.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Uh so, quister, what you said? It was the thirty
a matter of confusing the thirtieth and the thirty first. Yes, latitude, yes, okay?
And what year did this happen?
Speaker 4 (24:20):
It would have been the early eighteen hundreds. It's before
Alabama was officially declared a state, which was I think
I have this written down. It's eighteen.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Hey, hey, you're you're eating our time.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
I know. I'm sorry. I have the facts written down,
but I didn't have any listen, I'm really much stronger
on English history than American history. Yes, but it was
in the early eighteen hundreds. It was before Alabama was
made of state, and certainly much before Florida. Florida, I know,
was eighteen forty five, which was much later.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Okay, ah, you got anything, elseen. No, I feel like
I feel like this is true.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I think it's probably true.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Well been, well like it is was lock it three
two one halack true.
Speaker 4 (25:08):
It's so not true. It's like winning doesn't even mean
anything anymore.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
You're making me.
Speaker 4 (25:16):
Face an existential crisis here, gentlemen, did you ever consider
that Maybe that's exactly our intent. I'm going to keep
playing the game anyway, all right, it's all I have. Well,
let me tell you exactly what did happen, though, is
just to give you the real story, because it's actually
fascinating why there's a panhandle. So we have to keep
in mind there were four major players involved. We have England,
(25:39):
we have France, we have Spain, we have America. Now,
before the American Revolution, you had England with the colonies
that would become the United States of America. You had
Spain that owned Florida, and that went as far it
could have gone as far west as the Mississippi. You
had France that owned the Louisiana Territory that was much
(26:00):
of the midwest and the south of what would become
the United States of America. Now, France and Spain were
sort of in disagreement of where that border was along
the southern edge the Gulf Coast, and they eventually decided
that Perdido River was the unofficial border, which is between
Mobile Bay and Pensacola, Florida. And so they decided that
(26:23):
was the border. But then a whole bunch of different
stuff happened. England won the Seven Years War. They took
over Florida from Spain. Then Spain gave the Louisiana territory
to or France gave the Louisiana Territory territory to Spain.
This is what happens when I do the Renaissance Festival
three days in a row, I can't talk straight to anymore.
(26:43):
So Spain now has the Louisiana territory. England now has Florida. Okay,
England extends the Florida border all the way out to
the Mississippi. So now the Florida's Panhandle reaches much further
to the west. All right, all right, then America is revolting,
you could argue frequently throughout its history. But it ends
(27:05):
up winning the Revolutionary War. England loses, Florida goes back
to Spain. So now Spain owns Florida, but now the
border goes all the way to the Mississippi. Spain gives
the Louisiana territory back to France, which then turns around
and sells it to the Americans.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
This would be really helpful with a whiteboard.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
Well, here's or a lot of red string. So here's
what the Americans do. They say, well, we're buying the
Louisiana territory, but what we're going to do is we're
going to refer to louisianatory back when this map was drawn,
where the Padido River was the border. Okay, So they
essentially tells Spain, oh, no, we bought the Louisiana territory
from like three times before.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Spain said no. And then America sent a bunch of
troops down to the Gulf coast and Spain said all right, fine,
And then a few years later Spain ends up surrendering
Flora to the United States, and that is why Florida
has a panhandle and Alabama has a very limited Gulf coast.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
Well said, Well said, you know, I've always It's fascinating
because I think where I got I got tripped up
is as soon as you were talking about the original
size of the colony of Georgia. I know part of
that is true, yes, like all right, fine, that's true. Yes,
but I probably should have listened be the first.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
Party that part's true. The rest of it's going to
be right.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
I should probably not treat these very important questions the
way I treat group emails down.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
Everyone, or any conversation with me.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
Honestly, that's not true. No, I listen pretty pretty in depth.
You know, I'm caught. I have my finger on the
pulse of the Jonathan Strickland aspect of your life. By
the way, congratulations on wrapping up the Renaissance Festival.
Speaker 4 (28:50):
Thank you, thank you. I I think it added about
five years to the age that I already am, or
perhaps you could say subtracted them from the end of
my life.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Either way, it gets you right around the age you
were supposed to be. For your character, though, because that's
what really matter.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
Right around the age was when he died.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Yes, well take some take some vitamins. Yes, look, you
I have unfortunate news. You can't die yet, Nola, and
I and all our friends listening at home need to
at least get a little bit out of the hole, right.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
Right, Yes, I don't even know how, and you'm ahead now,
all right, But that's fine, it's fine, it's fine. I
was actually going to give you the true one originally,
and then I thought, well, this one's it's so convoluted,
but it's obviously true.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Yeah, And we've been we've been exploring and no I
think you said this at the top, we've been exploring
a lot of stuff about boundaries and borders recently. So
this this was an excellent question. And you know, one
of these days we're going to get one right.
Speaker 4 (29:57):
Well, it's also it also really illustrates how this is
a sticky, sticky situation, even when you're looking at borders
between two areas in the same country. There's there's other
stories about states that have had border disputes that had
to be settled by Congress when they were actually establishing
(30:19):
the states.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Yeah, like the Ohio, Michigan.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
Exactly, Like like Ohio, Michigan and that's little thin sliver
who owns that?
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yes, yes, who owns Toledo. So thank you so much
for coming on the show, Jonathan, I without giving spoilers
because you got a lot of irons in the fire
right now, Where can people visit to learn more about you,
your work and your shows.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
Not certainly you can go to techstuffpodcast dot com to
look at the more than one thousand episodes of tech
stuff I've recorded over the last eleven years.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Is that recent one thousand?
Speaker 4 (30:57):
It's one thousand. I'm almost up to twelve under now, okay,
because I remember, Yes, I hit one thousand last year.
That's right, actually because two years ago. But yes, it's
a We've been doing a lot of interesting work, especially
around artificial intelligence and ethics and things of that nature.
Not very historically oriented, but I would recommend if you
(31:20):
have any interest in the ethics of technology. Yeah, there's
been quite a few episodes about that recently, fantastic and
I ignore all of that when I come on here.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Great, great, keep your characters like that of Offspring song
right deep thems up right exactly, but hey, hey, don't
pay no mind. As we were saying, earlier. This is
the end of the episode, but not the show, and
the conversation continues. We want to hear your thoughts. You
can find us all on Instagram, Facebook, and not Twitch.
(31:53):
That's the thing you did, but Twitter, which is a
different thing that sounds similar.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Twitter is my new platform that I'm starting.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
I like Twitter, Paig.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
It's sort of a Twitch Twitter hybrid that is exactly that.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
Yes, I think I have a physical tick that will
make me an ideal influencer on Twitter.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
You can get it on the ground floor. Excellent.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
I like Thither. It's the startup I have that's it
overlays your favorite GPS devices and gives you driving instructions
in old English. So it's a great Frank gift for
your friends.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
Oh, you were supposed to go Thither, but you turned
you on.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
A pos on your house.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
So you can find out more about our brilliant, world
changing startups on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians, where you
can meet our favorite part of the show, your fellow listeners.
You can also follow our individual misadventures and Shenanigan ree
on Instagram. I'm at Ben Bullen, i.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
Am at how Now, Noel Brown, I'm at John Strickland with.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Or without a no H.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Got it he used to be at no H. But
it's weird.
Speaker 4 (33:06):
Yes, just to know you exactly. No one knew what
the what the l was going on?
Speaker 1 (33:12):
H Okay, yeah, yeah, no, I'm with you. It's been
a long day. Big thanks to our guest super producer
Paul Mission Controlled Decat, who has been chilling with us
all afternoon and is probably h what do you think? No,
he think is tired of us.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Yet he looks okay, it doesn't look too cranky. He's
got a little rye smile on his face.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
I think it always looks great.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
I think it was tired of you before you came
in here. Actually if he has been working with you
guys for a really long time, right right.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
Well, thank you either way, Paul.
Speaker 3 (33:43):
Also thank you to super producer Casey Labusch Pegram wherever
he may roam. Big thanks to Alex Williams who can
post our theme.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And thanks to friend of the show Christopher Hasiotis. Thanks
as always to Jonathan Strickland aka the Wizard. Thanks to
our research associate Gabe and Hey No, thanks to you man,
safe travels and.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
To you as well. We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
I put it. I've been putting these in. If we
just go to twenty twenty six, we'll do Fort Blunder,
and then the political body doubles. Yeah there, just go
to twenty tweets. Yeah, yeah, it's about Yeah, I could
(00:23):
do all right, Fellow Ridiculous Historians, we are back with
this week's classic episode, Everybody fondly remembers the War of
eighteen twelve.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh yeah, what a time, What a time to be alive?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
What a time. It's no eighteen eleven, but we'll keep it.
This is this is a crazy one better, it's one better.
It's what what could be better than? Eighteen eleven? Eighteen
twelve war side. This is one of our favorite kind
of genre of ridiculous history, because it's about when very
(01:06):
powerful militaries do stuff in an incredibly dumb way.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Oh boy, did they ever? I think the title says
it all.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Fort Blunder, the US fort mistakenly built in Canada.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Let's roll it to me.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(01:51):
the show, Ridiculous Historians. This episode is about a hilarious mistake,
a goof a doof a whoopsie, a blunder. My name
is Ben A blender, A blending of blunders, perhaps.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Yeah, a blending of blunders that on first blush seems
a little unremarkable. But no, sir, No, sir, was not
unremarkable because it has to do with borders. We've been
doing a little border theme lately. But we had that
war between what was it, Ohio and a mission into war.
They had that no man's land where no man knew
who it belonged to because of a poor mapping and
(02:30):
just poor what speculation right or cartography? Cartography, that's the word, Ben.
Such is the case in today's episode where the US
accidentally built a military based on the wrong side of
the US Canada border spoiler alert.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
But there's more to it than that, isn't there.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
So in eighteen sixteen it became a big deal that
we protect our border with Canada.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Why, you might ask, why is that? No, I'll tell
you why, Ben, You think we think.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Of Canada as our mellow you know, stoner neighbors to
the north.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Yeah, it's like it's one time I don't completely agree
with this. One time a friend of mine referred to
Canada as diet America, and I said, why is that
And they said, well, it's a little better for you,
and I was like, you know nothing about the diet
soda game man watching out of this analogy, Oh, we
should give a shout out to our guest super producer
Paul Mission Controlled decand.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
He's like our Canada.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
He actually he and he is our Canada. He and
super producer Casey Begram are very good friends outside of
the show. The American version of Casey.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
It's funny Casey. He has his second life in Paris,
France as LaBouche, but occasionally he carries on a third
life as a logger in French Canada also goes by
the moniker.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
LaBouche wears a slightly different outfit.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Much more of a plaid flannel lumberjack flannel situation. And yeah,
and he has an unstoppable force in the logging industry
and it.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
All ties into his Parisian criminal empire, which we should
save for its own episode. I think we should because
boundaries are important.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Speaking of boundaries, so we're talking about Canada. We think
of them as as our friends, which they are, but
at the time, I mean, there's still what what would
you call them then? A territory of the United Kingdom, Like,
how are they connected to the United Kingdom.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Well, the thing is that the British use Canadian land
as a taking off point for invasions. So during both
the American Revolutionary War and again in the War of
eighteen twelve, British forces launch invasions down Lake Champlain with
hopes of cutting America in two. And so the Madison
(04:53):
administration says, this is a weak point, this cannot be happening.
We have to do something. Rum pump, something must be done.
We need a sick fortress, we need a dope a fortress.
That's the best solution. So they construct a modern, heavy
fort modern for that day on the New York shore
(05:15):
of Lake Champlain. And they named the place Fort Montgomery,
in honor of General Richard Montgomery, a hero of the
Revolutionary War.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Yeah, and this dude named Joseph Totten, who later became
the Chief engineer of the US Army, of the whole army,
This guy meant business. He oversaw the construction and it
was a thirty foot tall structure. It was made out
of the same Vermont limestone that later was used to
construct Radio City Music Hall and the Brooklyn Bridge, and
(05:45):
they built this thing up. It was going to have
one hundred and twenty five cannon ports and any ship
that was passing by on the British side was going
to be given What.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
For sounds great on paper, here's the problem. This was
an embarrassment on multiple levels. And we'll get to the
big one in a sec. But just the building itself,
it was, as you said, eight sided, thirty feet high,
but it was built on a weak, unstable foundation that
was mainly composed of debris bought from ruins of the
(06:18):
Plattsburgh batteries and outworks. So literally, the foundations of this
thing are weak. It can't hold, and it doesn't matter
if it does hold, because they figured out what was
wrong pretty quickly.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
Yeah, at the most embarrassing time possible, because Madison actually
showed up to get a glance, to get a gander
at the progress that you know that he he had
proposed this fort, and that is when they realized that
they had actually built the thing on the Canada side.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Let's get a tire screech, perfect. Yeah, you see, under
the seventeen eighty th Retreaty of Paris, the border between
New York and Quebec was the forty fifth parallel, but
the previous understanding of the location of that line of
latitude was incorrect, a fact that surveyors did not discover
until eighteen eighteen. At this point, the US has already
(07:18):
spent two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars on construction.
Speaker 3 (07:24):
That has not jump change of the time had a serious,
big imaginary military money.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, let's let's inflation calculate this real quick.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
Here we go.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Two hundred and seventy five thousand dollars in eighteen eighteen
is now worth approximately five million, five hundred thirty three thousand,
five hundred nineteen dollars and sixty nine cents.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
Okay, so maybe not like Avatar money, but you know,
five million dollars five million bucks.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
First Hypto instruction.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Sure, that's a lot.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
That's a lot for a stone structure. It's true.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
There wasn't even any like moving parts. There wasn't even
any technology. Itolved probably windows, windows, sure, door hinges, that's
the original moving parts. Yes, so this is this is
a tremendous embarrassment. Right, What do they do when they
figure out that this fort designed to protect the US
from Canada, is you know in Canada. Yeah, And it
(08:26):
wasn't until eighteen forty two that this discrepancy about the
borderline was resolved. There's something called the Webster Ashburton Treaty
that provided the understanding that the original border was going
to hold the old line that was surveyed by Valentine
and Collins in seventeen seventy four that was known as
the forty fifth degree of north latitude and then became
(08:48):
known as the actual divide between New York and Vermont
on one side and the British province of Canada on
the other. And from this is a quote actually from
a neat Orama article, and from said point of intersection
west along the said divide lies as heretofore known and
understood to the Iroquois as or Sir Lawrence River.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
You know, this is back in the day when if
you wanted stuff to sound totally profound, you added, said
it just peppered and said at some point, you know
our said guest producer Paul Decant is agreeing here. So
it's interesting because they tried to resolve the issue. But
while they were resolving this, we have to remember this
(09:31):
fort had been abandoned decades. Locals are looting the construction
site because the work stopped, you know, and Fort Montgomery,
by the time eighteen forty two comes around, is widely
known as Fort Blunder. But to your point, now, after
this Webster Ashburton Treaty, that's the one, right, they resumed
(09:53):
construction in eighteen forty four, and Fort Blunder actually get
some get some play. It's a it's a working base.
You just actually me then, No, I'm just saying actually,
like I'm surprised.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Okay, that's fair.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Right, Look, it's a living language. I'll speak how I want.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
I see you and as well you should, then I
will ask questions as I want.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Do you Are you one of those people who's intimidated
by the use of the word actually or is it?
For me? It's when it's at the beginning of a sentence,
it always means that, so why are you doing this?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Yeah, it's sort of to me.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
It's a license to tune out whatever the person's about
to say after that, So I actually appreciate it. It's
kind of a context clue where you know whatever's going
to follow is going to be pretentious and unhelpful.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Like that old Dimitri Martin observation when he says I
love bumper stickers. It's such a convenient way of saying,
let's never talk agreed. Oh I like bumper stickers, They're
just not for me.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
They're not for me either.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
No, No, I have a virgin car.
Speaker 1 (10:58):
This is strange. You can see photos of Fort Blunder
or Fort Montgomery excuses. If you want to check out
some close up pictures, visit historic Lakes dot org, where
you can see you can see the lay of the land,
you can see the old map where they miscalculated everything.
You can even see a sketch about Blunder, which depicts
(11:23):
the structure we talked about earlier.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
I don't know if we talked about some of the
features of the fort outside of the gun turrets or whatever,
the little windows, but it did at one point stand
forty eight feet high. The western facing wall was known
as the Gorge, and that was adjacent to a giant
called that's something called a cover face or an earthen bank,
and that was created as a defensive aid for land attacks,
(11:47):
and then it had a moat. I didn't realize this
is I mean, it's very much like old school kind
of castle type features. Right, It had a moat which
was referred to as a wet ditch, which was filled
with lake water. These days it is not is not
looking so hot. It is quite worse for wear because
a lot of local you know, kids and ruffians and
biker gangs, you know, have just tagged it all up.
(12:11):
It is actually for sale if you're in the market.
In the nineteen twenties, the US sold Fort Montgomery at
an auction, and then in nineteen eighty three a Victor
Pod who is a shipping magnate from Montreal. That's when
he bought it, and he offered part of the property
to New York State as a historic preservation site, but
(12:31):
New York did not want it. Then Pod died in
ninety nine and his sons inherited the fort and tried
to sell it on eBay and actually got one valid
bid for five million bucks, but it fell through. Still
for sale, I believe the current asking price is around
a million bucks.
Speaker 1 (12:50):
That's a lot of depreciation, really is from five point
five to three whatever, just sixty nine.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
That's worse than like dealership depreciation, like when you drive
the car off the line, you know, one million, one million,
not even a million, nine hundred and ninety five thousand.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
Ah yeah, So from five point five million dollars and
sixty nine cents to just under a million dollars, that's
boat level depreciation, and you know, hopefully a lesson learned.
There's a great Atlas Obscure article about the current situation
Fort Montgomery is encountering, which just says for sale an abandoned,
(13:29):
decaying fort on a private island. It says decaying, Uh huh,
and it is. You can see some great pictures. It's overgrown,
there's graffiti all over it. They're probably you know, syringes.
You don't think they.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
Would have gone in there and gussied it up a
little bit like they did for real estate photos. You know,
they're really not trying to upsell this thing, are they been?
Speaker 4 (13:46):
No?
Speaker 1 (13:47):
No, they're not really, because the problem here is one
of infrastructure, right, and it's still on the National Register
of Historic Place is But okay, everybody knows that it
needs to be saved, but nobody's willing to pony up
the scratch and cheddar, the itchy cheddar to support it.
(14:10):
For instance, the Preservation League of New York State included
this Fort on its Seven to Save List in two
thousand and nine, a roundup of at risk historic sites
that need help, and according to Katie Peace, the communications
director of the Preservation League of New York State, there
are no current plans to rehabilitate the site. It joins
(14:33):
the ranks of other historical places and objects of significance,
like the gunboat Spitfire, which was part of the American
fleet that contributed to the Saratoga Victory in seventeen seventy seven,
or the John van Houston House, which looks the worse
for wear, but is an early eighteenth century example of
(14:54):
Dutch settlement along the Hudson, the plum Bronson House, which
is also just rapidly deteriorating, and the Magdalen Island, which
has an ancient past as a stopping place for Native
American populations or First Nations and Europeans who came later,
the historic South Street Seaport, the Burden Iron Works Museum.
(15:18):
Those are the seven, but there are many, many more,
And when you look around, whether it's in the US
or in other countries, I'm sure there's no shortage of
decaying pieces of history that should be preserved. Like have
you ever driven through Tennessee.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
Yeah, a little bit, but not a ton. Give me
the scoop.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Tennessee is there must be some government program. I can
say this because I have family there. There must be
some government program to make sure that everybody has at
least one to two decaying barns in their fields. And
you can even see them when you just drive on
the interstate. But I'm always baffled by that, you know
what I mean, because these barns are in use, but
(15:58):
they're ready for one match to make them.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
That's very similar to driving some of the rural roads
in Georgia, like between Atlanta and Athens, for example, or
Augusta and Athens. Lots of big open fields with just
a single ramshackled barn in the middle, and it looks
like it's leaning kind of at a canted angle, like
it could fall down with just a light breath of wind.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Wiregrass country, especially if you drive. This is an example
for people who don't know how big this state is,
especially driving from Atlanta to Savannah down on Georgia's small
Atlantic coast. Have you made that drive?
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I have. It's been a minute, though it's a long one.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
It's a long one. And it's not a particularly exciting
one for some people. But it's what how long is it?
Speaker 2 (16:46):
It's hours from here to Savannah to Atlanta. I believe
it's about six hours.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Six hours. Yeah, six long hours, full of full of history,
and full of things that look the worse for where
you know. It reminds me whenever I travel somewhere, whether
for work or whether for personal reasons, I always try
(17:13):
to find a local museum or an historic site. In Texas, recently,
a super producer, Paul Michigan Control Decking and I visited
the Alamo and hey, check this out, man, I got
something for you.
Speaker 3 (17:28):
Ben is now rummaging through his bag of chicks. Okay,
here you go.
Speaker 1 (17:34):
I couldn't bring you the actual Alamo, but I found
I found a little funny.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
It's a pamphlet. It's a handbill for the Alamo.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
I would say it's a femera.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
Yeah, it absolutely is.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Ben, give me the rundown of the Alamo as I
perused this.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Hand So so the thing that I think startled both
Paul and myself was, and Paul, tell me if I
get this wrong, is that when we went to the
actual Alamo and went inside, it's free to attend. By
the way, everything was under restoration or construction work, and
there were there were entire pieces of of the building
(18:11):
that needed to be saved, right, Uh, that were off limits,
and we we didn't get to do a lot of
the fun stuff. There's a re enactor who will builk
you in a card game. We missed that. It was
early in the morning. Uh. But I'm a huge I'm
a huge fan of that stuff, and I and I
hope that I hope that we can as a species
(18:33):
do our best to preserve the physical traces of those
who came before us, whether that is a military fort,
a vessel of note, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
I see there's a pretty big footprint for the gift
shop here, Ben. Was it spectacular? Was it an above average
gift shop?
Speaker 4 (18:50):
It was?
Speaker 1 (18:51):
You know it was it was. Uh, it was interesting.
It's interesting. I I did not personally pick up any
if so.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
I was there.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
I was there for this story. But they have all
you know, Texas branded stuff, uh, shotglasses, astros, replica guns. No, No,
not this time. If if they were giving out actual
pieces of the Alamo, might probably pick one up, but
that would maybe defeat their purposes. But you know what,
my friend, if ever I find myself on Fort Montgomery
(19:23):
or Fort Blunder, I will pick up some pieces of
history for us.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Well, that's what we do here on Ridiculous History, man,
We pick up the pieces of history. We put them
back together like a veritable Rubik's cube.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
And this ends our episode. But not.
Speaker 4 (19:49):
It's time, gentle men.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Jonathan Strickland ak the Quisterland quiz.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
It's going to be back.
Speaker 1 (19:58):
Guys. You've got a lot of nerve, my friend.
Speaker 4 (20:00):
I sure do.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Just in general, it's just let's just let's.
Speaker 4 (20:04):
Just establish this just for a moment though, gentlemen. Uh huh,
you're in my playground now, because you're not in your
normal studio. You're in my studio. That's true, that's true.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
We are so we have a number of studios here
at h Q, and Jonathan, this is one of the
studios where you spend a lot of time recording. Uh
let's see tech stuff.
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Sure, that's right. In your studio, I record the brink.
But in my studio, I record tech stuff. Yes.
Speaker 1 (20:35):
And you know, I gotta say, I love what you're
done with the place.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Thanks, thanks, you're enjoying my butt groove. Right now, you're
in my chair.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
I'm in your chair.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
That's the chair I sit in.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
Oh that's right. Yeah, I didn't think that. Are we cool?
Do you want to switch chairs? I'm fine with that.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
If we switch chairs, then you can see whether or
not the thing I'm about to tell you, if it's
true or false. That's right, you just I'll just stay here.
You're here for a reason. Yes, And the most cringe
worthy segment in all the podcasting where I present a
scenario to the two hosts of Ridiculous History and they
determine whether or not I made it up or if
(21:10):
it's a real one. And I understand we were talking
about things about borders and mistakes about placing things places
where you may not actually own them, so this is
a somewhat related to that. But on the other side
(21:31):
of the United States of America, the southern side. Have
you ever wondered why Florida has a panhandle that seems
to cut off the bottom of the state of Alabama all.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
The time, constantly keeps me up at night.
Speaker 4 (21:45):
Well, I have a scenario for you. You will have three
minutes to decide whether or not and in fact, it
is true or false, and of course, we always have
an arbitrary rule, and I didn't come up with one beforehand.
So if you're going to ask me a question before
you get you have to yell spring break rules and
then you can ask a question. Deal because it has
(22:06):
to do with Florida and Alabama done all right, here we go.
It's because of a really bad map and some quote
unquote surveyors. After winning or purchasing territories from England, Spain,
and France, the American government got down to the business
of establishing states in the early eighteen hundreds. Originally, the
(22:30):
Colony of Georgia stretched much further to the west, but
it was decided that part of that land would be
created into the state of Alabama. The Chattahoochee River would
serve as a border much of the state line and
would go all the way south, and a team of
cartographers determined that the Gulf Coast of what would have
(22:54):
been Alabama fell on the thirty one degree latitude. Here's
the problem. The actual latitude line for the Gulf Coast
is thirty degrees, which meant that the map actually ended
much further north than the Gulf coast. But that's how
(23:14):
it was written down, and because that's how it was
written down in official documents, that's where the end of
Alabama would be. And because of that error, Alabama does
not have a Gulf coast that stretches across its entire width. Instead,
it just has Mobile Bay. Begin Yeah, yes, mister Brown.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
Well, I've got to run to the timer. It's in
the other studio. Hang on, Hey, we're good.
Speaker 4 (23:42):
All right, We'll just take about five seconds off that,
all right? But yes, rolls, yes, yes, Ms Brown.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
Is this there's anything to do with the band Florida
Georgia line?
Speaker 4 (23:52):
It certainly has not, as far as they know, and
thank the heavens, has nothing to do with that band.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Okay, rules, yes.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
Mister bullet.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
Uh so, quister, what you said? It was the thirty
a matter of confusing the thirtieth and the thirty first. Yes, latitude, yes, okay?
And what year did this happen?
Speaker 4 (24:20):
It would have been the early eighteen hundreds. It's before
Alabama was officially declared a state, which was I think
I have this written down. It's eighteen.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Hey, hey, you're you're eating our time.
Speaker 4 (24:34):
I know. I'm sorry. I have the facts written down,
but I didn't have any listen, I'm really much stronger
on English history than American history. Yes, but it was
in the early eighteen hundreds. It was before Alabama was
made of state, and certainly much before Florida. Florida, I know,
was eighteen forty five, which was much later.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Okay, ah, you got anything, elseen. No, I feel like
I feel like this is true.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I think it's probably true.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
Well been, well like it is was lock it three
two one halack true.
Speaker 4 (25:08):
It's so not true. It's like winning doesn't even mean
anything anymore.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
You're making me.
Speaker 4 (25:16):
Face an existential crisis here, gentlemen, did you ever consider
that Maybe that's exactly our intent. I'm going to keep
playing the game anyway, all right, it's all I have. Well,
let me tell you exactly what did happen, though, is
just to give you the real story, because it's actually
fascinating why there's a panhandle. So we have to keep
in mind there were four major players involved. We have England,
(25:39):
we have France, we have Spain, we have America. Now,
before the American Revolution, you had England with the colonies
that would become the United States of America. You had
Spain that owned Florida, and that went as far it
could have gone as far west as the Mississippi. You
had France that owned the Louisiana Territory that was much
(26:00):
of the midwest and the south of what would become
the United States of America. Now, France and Spain were
sort of in disagreement of where that border was along
the southern edge the Gulf Coast, and they eventually decided
that Perdido River was the unofficial border, which is between
Mobile Bay and Pensacola, Florida. And so they decided that
(26:23):
was the border. But then a whole bunch of different
stuff happened. England won the Seven Years War. They took
over Florida from Spain. Then Spain gave the Louisiana territory
to or France gave the Louisiana Territory territory to Spain.
This is what happens when I do the Renaissance Festival
three days in a row, I can't talk straight to anymore.
(26:43):
So Spain now has the Louisiana territory. England now has Florida. Okay,
England extends the Florida border all the way out to
the Mississippi. So now the Florida's Panhandle reaches much further
to the west. All right, all right, then America is revolting,
you could argue frequently throughout its history. But it ends
(27:05):
up winning the Revolutionary War. England loses, Florida goes back
to Spain. So now Spain owns Florida, but now the
border goes all the way to the Mississippi. Spain gives
the Louisiana territory back to France, which then turns around
and sells it to the Americans.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
This would be really helpful with a whiteboard.
Speaker 4 (27:23):
Well, here's or a lot of red string. So here's
what the Americans do. They say, well, we're buying the
Louisiana territory, but what we're going to do is we're
going to refer to louisianatory back when this map was drawn,
where the Padido River was the border. Okay, So they
essentially tells Spain, oh, no, we bought the Louisiana territory
from like three times before.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (27:45):
Spain said no. And then America sent a bunch of
troops down to the Gulf coast and Spain said all right, fine,
And then a few years later Spain ends up surrendering
Flora to the United States, and that is why Florida
has a panhandle and Alabama has a very limited Gulf coast.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
Well said, Well said, you know, I've always It's fascinating
because I think where I got I got tripped up
is as soon as you were talking about the original
size of the colony of Georgia. I know part of
that is true, yes, like all right, fine, that's true. Yes,
but I probably should have listened be the first.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
Party that part's true. The rest of it's going to
be right.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
I should probably not treat these very important questions the
way I treat group emails down.
Speaker 4 (28:35):
Everyone, or any conversation with me.
Speaker 1 (28:37):
Honestly, that's not true. No, I listen pretty pretty in depth.
You know, I'm caught. I have my finger on the
pulse of the Jonathan Strickland aspect of your life. By
the way, congratulations on wrapping up the Renaissance Festival.
Speaker 4 (28:50):
Thank you, thank you. I I think it added about
five years to the age that I already am, or
perhaps you could say subtracted them from the end of
my life.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
Either way, it gets you right around the age you
were supposed to be. For your character, though, because that's
what really matter.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
Right around the age was when he died.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Yes, well take some take some vitamins. Yes, look, you
I have unfortunate news. You can't die yet, Nola, and
I and all our friends listening at home need to
at least get a little bit out of the hole, right.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
Right, Yes, I don't even know how, and you'm ahead now,
all right, But that's fine, it's fine, it's fine. I
was actually going to give you the true one originally,
and then I thought, well, this one's it's so convoluted,
but it's obviously true.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Yeah, And we've been we've been exploring and no I
think you said this at the top, we've been exploring
a lot of stuff about boundaries and borders recently. So
this this was an excellent question. And you know, one
of these days we're going to get one right.
Speaker 4 (29:57):
Well, it's also it also really illustrates how this is
a sticky, sticky situation, even when you're looking at borders
between two areas in the same country. There's there's other
stories about states that have had border disputes that had
to be settled by Congress when they were actually establishing
(30:19):
the states.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Yeah, like the Ohio, Michigan.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
Exactly, Like like Ohio, Michigan and that's little thin sliver
who owns that?
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yes, yes, who owns Toledo. So thank you so much
for coming on the show, Jonathan, I without giving spoilers
because you got a lot of irons in the fire
right now, Where can people visit to learn more about you,
your work and your shows.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
Not certainly you can go to techstuffpodcast dot com to
look at the more than one thousand episodes of tech
stuff I've recorded over the last eleven years.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Is that recent one thousand?
Speaker 4 (30:57):
It's one thousand. I'm almost up to twelve under now, okay,
because I remember, Yes, I hit one thousand last year.
That's right, actually because two years ago. But yes, it's
a We've been doing a lot of interesting work, especially
around artificial intelligence and ethics and things of that nature.
Not very historically oriented, but I would recommend if you
(31:20):
have any interest in the ethics of technology. Yeah, there's
been quite a few episodes about that recently, fantastic and
I ignore all of that when I come on here.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Great, great, keep your characters like that of Offspring song
right deep thems up right exactly, but hey, hey, don't
pay no mind. As we were saying, earlier. This is
the end of the episode, but not the show, and
the conversation continues. We want to hear your thoughts. You
can find us all on Instagram, Facebook, and not Twitch.
(31:53):
That's the thing you did, but Twitter, which is a
different thing that sounds similar.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Twitter is my new platform that I'm starting.
Speaker 1 (32:00):
I like Twitter, Paig.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
It's sort of a Twitch Twitter hybrid that is exactly that.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
Yes, I think I have a physical tick that will
make me an ideal influencer on Twitter.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
You can get it on the ground floor. Excellent.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
I like Thither. It's the startup I have that's it
overlays your favorite GPS devices and gives you driving instructions
in old English. So it's a great Frank gift for
your friends.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
Oh, you were supposed to go Thither, but you turned
you on.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
A pos on your house.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
So you can find out more about our brilliant, world
changing startups on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians, where you
can meet our favorite part of the show, your fellow listeners.
You can also follow our individual misadventures and Shenanigan ree
on Instagram. I'm at Ben Bullen, i.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
Am at how Now, Noel Brown, I'm at John Strickland with.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Or without a no H.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Got it he used to be at no H. But
it's weird.
Speaker 4 (33:06):
Yes, just to know you exactly. No one knew what
the what the l was going on?
Speaker 1 (33:12):
H Okay, yeah, yeah, no, I'm with you. It's been
a long day. Big thanks to our guest super producer
Paul Mission Controlled Decat, who has been chilling with us
all afternoon and is probably h what do you think? No,
he think is tired of us.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
Yet he looks okay, it doesn't look too cranky. He's
got a little rye smile on his face.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
I think it always looks great.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
I think it was tired of you before you came
in here. Actually if he has been working with you
guys for a really long time, right right.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
Well, thank you either way, Paul.
Speaker 3 (33:43):
Also thank you to super producer Casey Labusch Pegram wherever
he may roam. Big thanks to Alex Williams who can
post our theme.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
And thanks to friend of the show Christopher Hasiotis. Thanks
as always to Jonathan Strickland aka the Wizard. Thanks to
our research associate Gabe and Hey No, thanks to you man,
safe travels and.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
To you as well. We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.
NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal
Gregg Rosenthal and a rotating crew of elite NFL Media co-hosts, including Patrick Claybon, Colleen Wolfe, Steve Wyche, Nick Shook and Jourdan Rodrigue of The Athletic get you caught up daily on all the NFL news and analysis you need to be smarter and funnier than your friends.