May 4, 2024 • 34 mins
Today botox is one of the world's most well-known wrinkle treatments, as well as a go-to joke in the realm of pop culture. But where did this treatment come from, and what on Earth does it have to do with sausage? Join Ben, Noel and Max as they trace the origins of botox to one man's unending obsession with food safety and rotting pork in this classic episode.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, no confession time, man, what you know, we're getting
on in years and I'm just wondering, have you or
Max ever considered botox?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I don't think you need Thank you, thank you for
that caveat. I'm gonna say it's not for me. I know,
shade or grudge against anyone that feels like that's something
that will improve their self image or self esteem. But
it's just never been something that I found to be
of interest to me personally.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
I was startled to read. I'm right, they often look startled.
Folks do what you will, you know, as long as
it's something positive and it makes you happy. But if
somebody came to me and they said, Ben, you need botox,
it would kind of send me on a spiral.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Just to be honest, absolutely, And you know I mean
in this are very public facing day and age where
folks are judged for their looks on the regular people
who are public figures at the pressure to look your
best or whatever. But it turns out the origins of
this kind of thing, what is the word I believe batcha, Yeah,
(01:08):
that's right, are very unusual and dare we say ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Yeah, this may give you a pause, but we think
it's a very fascinating and ridiculous origin story. And obviously,
like you're saying, we're not taking potshots for anybody who
was doing botox or similar procedures, but I think it
is important in an age of social media and everybody
(01:35):
being to some degree of public figure, it's important to
realize that there can be dangers to that because people
have been getting botox at younger and younger ages, which
you know, not to sound like an old fogy, but
I would be you know, were I a parent, I
would be a little concerned if I had like a
college or a high school aged kid who came to
(01:57):
me and said, Dad, for Christmas or whatever, I want
my birthday or something, I want botox.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
I will say.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
I have a friend who she gets botox injections very
not very uncommonly, and what she always says is like
if you just do it a little bit, and so
they tell you like a little bit, like you know,
helps out. But like when you see those uh, you know,
the celebrities with the uh terror faces, probably uh that's
because they've just going way too hard. And like you know,
(02:30):
she was talking to me about I'm like, okay, that
doesn't like, that's a different way of thinking about it
from what how I've always.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Thought about something with moderation, right.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Well, I mean, it's no accident that the tox part
of botox uh is in there, because the baculinum toxin,
which has often been referred to as a miracle poison,
is in fact an incredibly poisonous biological material that in
small doses and when injected in the face, can cause
(03:01):
paralysis that is sort of desirable. I guess that causes
like wrinkles to be smoothed out and stuff. And again
to your point, Max, people that get it maybe a
little too frequently can have paralysis that is a little
bit more striking, let's just say.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And then there's I mean, also it ties into very
real problematic things like body dysmorphia, issues with self image.
But we think, regardless of your stance on botox personally
or philosophically, folks, we think you too will be amazed
to learn in today's classic episode the provenance of this treatment.
(03:40):
It comes not necessarily from the world of medicine so
much as one man's unending obsession with food safety and rotting.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Pork exactly, blood sausage even which was a very popular
delicacy and of Wutcheenberg, Germany in the late seventeen nineties
vill bod which is now known as Boden excuse me,
as you said, Wurtemberg Wurtenberg in Germany. There was a
(04:12):
rash of sickenings that came about due to a particular
batch of pork sausage, a rash of sickenings, a rash
of sickenings, and because of that, it was discovered that
this toxin that was created due to essentially food spoiling,
(04:32):
had some unintended side effects that were then kind of
co opted and used for something completely different.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So let's get into the tail. Ridiculous History is a
production of iHeartRadio, Friends and Neighbors. Whether you have frown lines,
(05:15):
cruise feet, or a face that is uncannily plump and
baby smooth, we'd like to welcome you to the show.
My name is Ben, my.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Name is Nolan. Ben. I couldn't help, but notice you
got a little bag and sag in action going on
under those eyes. They're gonna shoot some sausage poison up
in there to help you out.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Well. I appreciate you using it by its real name
I'm going for more of like a haggard investigator, dangerous
cop on you know, off the res. Yeah, I'm doing
like a cerproco thing. I'm working up toward it. But
it's true. I don't know if everybody noticed what Noel
just said. You called it sausage poisones.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Sausage poison, my friend, don't I have a syringe of
it right here on the ready.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
No, riddle me, riddle me this snole before you stab
me in the face with this. Where's this sausage poison
thing coming from? Is there another name.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
For that, the sausage Poison Party?
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I would buy that album.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Let's oh yeah, that sounds like fun. Yeah, well, no,
it's it's it's you know, a sausage poisoned by any
other name is still sausage poison. But we know and
love it today as a little thing called botox that
has taken the fashion and celebrity world by storm.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
I'm going to tell you about something that we didn't
talk about off air, but it really creeped me out,
and I'm going to keep the names out of it
out of respect for these people. So I know someone
who is a dude in his early twenties who has
had multiple botox injections?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Is it Jonathan Strickland, it is, it is?
Speaker 1 (06:55):
I don't know if it's I don't think it's Jonathan. No,
I don't know of anybody, any of our coworkers who
are botox fans. But it is an increasingly common procedure,
right and it's it used to be something that people
would just most Americans would just hear about on television.
(07:16):
But now that you know, when I learned that this
this guy I know is getting botox injections in his
early twenties noll and he says he has to have them,
it hit me how common this procedure is becoming.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And just you know, disclaim it right up front, utterly,
no shade, do do what you want to do, Do
what makes you feel good.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
It's your body.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
It's totally your body. But yeah, and I said, you know,
the fashion and world of celebrity was taken by storm,
but it is totally trickled down to us, you know,
every day folk. And like there are botox parties you
can have, Like people will go to gym's and set
up a little botox station because it's an easy, little
quick procedure it's just as rans that's loaded with this
stuff that is a processed form of back to heia
(08:00):
that actually gives you botulism. And we talked about sausage
poison because, as it turns out, the guy that discovered
this stuff found it in a batch of bad blood
sausages in Germany in the early eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
That's right. We can trace the success and prevalence of
what is called botox today to the discovery made by
this physician, Justinus Kerner, who, as Noel said, encountered a
batch of dangerous sausage sausage gone wrong in the early
eighteen hundreds. What Kerner discovered specifically were the spores of
(08:40):
something called Clustridium buchulinium microbes.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Yeah, and as it turns out, there were multiple strains
of it that were discovered. One in particular is what
has become used widely as botox because it has the
property of relaxing muscles. So you know, if you have
these lines in your face and then you inject this stuff,
it relaxes the muscle and causes the lines to kind
of disappear. And it's interesting because this scientist, as was
(09:08):
sort of practice in the day, he didn't have anybody
to try this stuff out on, so he just shot
himself up with it and literally, like a thing that
he knew was poisoning sickening people, he just decided, well,
maybe might find something interesting out here, and he started
injecting it in himself, and he discovered some pretty interesting properties.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Right, And we do have to say, in Kerner's defense,
his bona fides come thusly before he experimented on himself.
This is a quote from our friend Laurie L.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Dove.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
He rigorously tested hundreds of sausages to find these different
varieties of bachulism or bachelim toxin, and it turns out
that it was pretty common to have dodgy sausage in
Germany at this time because there were, you know, lower
standards of food safety, to be honest. And eventually this
(10:03):
led to something that sounds hilarious but is tragic and real,
which was, you know, scores of people dying due to
sausage poisoning outbreaks. This inspired Kerner. He worked himself up
to self experimentation, which sounds so crazy today, but you're
absolutely right, and he discovered it had this muscle relaxing
(10:25):
effect that you had mentioned and that it was not
fatal and that it could alter appearance to a degree.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
That's right. In addition to that muscle relaxing effect, it
also could cause vision problems, problems swallowing, vomiting, and severe
weakness of muscles when just used directly or experienced ingesting
it through the tainted food. And Kerner actually came up
with a pretty clever name for this stuff. He called
(10:52):
it worst Gifts, which means sausage poison. But I think
that as a sausage present.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Go there we go. But then the evolution of botox
applications continues for decades, right, and there's a big breakthrough
about seventy years after Kerner.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
It also involved tainted food. In this case, it was
a bespoiled ham that was brought to a funeral talking
about adding insult to injury. Some people died, actually three
people died and twenty three people were paralyzed by this
tainted ham. And a doctor by the name of Emiel
(11:32):
Pierre van Airmingham of Belgium had to investigate this botulism outbreak.
And it's interesting he actually studied under Robert Koch, doctor
Robert Coke, who found out about anthrax and tuberculosis and
cholera bacterial cause. So the bacterial causes exactly, and Airmingham
(11:54):
was able to make the connection between botulism and that
spore we talked about that he called Bacillis botulinus and
it was later renamed Claustridium botulinium.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
And this is a watershed moment for this science because
in the years afterwards people were able to identify more
strains of Baculinum talks and eventually arriving at seven total,
four of which could actually cause illness in human beings.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
That's right, And we're getting some of this info from
a great article on NBC News called Frozen in Time.
Botox over the years, from bad sausage to brow raiserre
a poisonous path to pretty That is some good alliterations,
good title. It's neat though, too, because as we move
into the forties and World War two, folks were experimenting
(12:50):
with this stuff as like a serious chemical weapon.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Yeah. According to a two thousand and four article in
Clinical Medicine by the it's the Journal of the Royal
College of Physicians in London, there was a plan on
the US side to have Chinese sex workers slip tiny
pills into the food or drink of high ranking Japanese
(13:15):
officers in the hope that this would prove fatal. They
got far enough to actually make the capsules, but they
never put it into action. But yeah, as Noel said,
they were actively planning to weaponize it. And now you know,
you can have a party and put a version of
it in your face.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
And that stuff you put in your face is the
Bauchulinium talks and type A. Because in the sixties and
seventies the research into that in particular was accelerated and
it was meant to help with muscle disorders. There was
a doctor by the name of Alan B. Scott of
the Smith Kettlewell Eye Research Foundation in San Francisco, who
(13:57):
did animal studies with that ty a, and he hypothesized
that you could actually use this stuff to help cure
people who had crossed eyes, cross eyed people who were
cross eyed. There's an official name for that. It is
called strabismus. I was not aware of that, and it
is a type of quote ophthalmic dystonia. And they found
(14:20):
that when injecting this stuff into the muscles around the
afflicted eyes, it loosened them up and caused them to
go straight.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
So now we see the transformation from a poison in
your sausage or you're what was the phrases, bespoiled ham
I like that, to a weapon of war or would
be weapon of war, to something that may, it turns out,
have health benefits. In nineteen seventy eight, doctor Allan Scott
(14:50):
gets FDA approval to inject more, you know, to experiment
on people with bachulinum toxin.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
And he trademarked it as acu Linum, and that was
the name of the company that he incorporated with that patent, and.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
By the late eighties drug makers were paying attention. A
manufacturer named Allergan purchased oculinum or or purchased rather, let's
be technical here, purchased the rights to distribute it, and
then the FDA approved this not just for strabismus, as
Noel mentioned, but also for spasms of the eyelid muscle
(15:26):
better known as bleferos spasms.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
And it wasn't long after Allergan acquired this serum that
they also got approval from the FDA to changed the name.
I didn't realize that was a thing. I guess it
makes sense because he can't be you know. That's why
the names of pharmaceuticals are often a little dull, because
I think they have to have some aspect in them
that ties to the actual substance, the actual material that's
(15:51):
in the product.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Can't call things smile pills, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
And they changed it to botox, which was a fun
portmanteau of batchy line toxin type A botox.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
Now here we are. We've gone through the discovery of
this stuff, the application of it, and the various uses
people tried to find for it that didn't quite work out,
like a weapon of war. Again, thank goodness, we went
with some health benefits instead, and very impressed. Good on
you human species. So the big question that is, how
(16:29):
did we get from how do we get from this
sausage poison to a wrinkle treatment? Right? It occurs in
the nineties when a Canadian ophthalmologist named doctor Jing Carruthers
notices that her patients with eye spasms are starting to
lose their frown lines, which is a specific type of
(16:52):
line on the face that comes with aging.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Right, It's like, oh, my goodness, Louise, not only is
I not twitching anymore, you also have taken on a
new youthful glow and because that's how people talked in
the nineties in Canada.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Yeah, yes, yes, these are accurate reenactments. And in nineteen
ninety two, doctor Caruthers, along with her husband, who was
a dermatologist, published a study that noted this C. Bauchulinum,
a exotoxin could be used to treat brow wrinkles, and
they had no idea about how quickly the rest of
(17:28):
the world would catch on, so dermatologists across North America
took note in the United States as well. By nineteen
ninety seven, botox used for wrinkles had spiked to the
point that Canada ran out and people began to panic.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
And it's like, you know, I have a pretty distinct
memory of like when you started hearing about botox, and
it wasn't for me anyway until the early two thousands.
And that's because the FDA in the United States didn't
give Allergan approval to use bow talks for that application
that the Canadians were so fond of already until two
(18:05):
thousand and two, and that's when they were able to
get that approval for the temporary improvement of appearance of
moderate to severe glabellar lines or those vertical frown lines
between your brow that you know, folks are wont to
get rid of.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
You hear them called worry lines, worry.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Lines, and this is not only this is in men
and women, and they can start to form as early
as like nineteen or twenty years old.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
This was a genuine treatment for something that a lot
of people were very insecure about. You know, people wanted
these wrinkles gone. And the FDA we keep issuing approval
for different uses, right, and botox became amazingly popular. I
think you and I and super producer Casey all remember
(18:58):
the glut of advertising. Right. It started to show up
in fictional shows too. Somebody would get botox. Right. You
started to see advertisements for it in malls, in gyms,
and it would be called the you know, the beauty
secret in the health mags or the different lifestyle magazines.
And then of course, inevitably knockoffs come into play, right,
(19:23):
which leads to one of my favorite phrases that we
found here. Photos photos that's rough. That's rough.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
It is like baby.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Laxative, like what I don't know, But I am not
a photos authority, thank goodness, but we do also have
to caution against using some kind of thing like that.
Did somebody make homegrown botulism? Did they just get the
right kind of stuff to grow?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
And some bad sausages do it in a petri dish
and in their closet.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
That's that's that's not a good look now.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
But a lot of people in the United States, a
lot of a lot of people did seem to think
that botox was a good look, despite like seven hundred
percent since the early two thousands, and that's according to
the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. But that number is
only tied to that cosmetic use. And as we've already
(20:17):
been through, quite a few other uses for this toxin
that are under review currently or actually in practice, and
that includes the treatment of cerebral palsy, a condition that
involves severely contracted muscles, so it makes sense that you
could use this to ease those spasms.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
It also has success with easy muscle spasms from multiple sclerosis,
or and this surprised me, treating migraines.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
But as with anything that you know, experiences such a
meteoric rise so quickly, there's there's a backlash sometimes right
and in that timeline on NBC they talk about this
botox backlash and terms you know, thrown around.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Like poker face and joker face.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
And the idea that it's just a little too available
and maybe people are doing it a little too willy
nilly and not thinking about maybe some of the side effects,
and even some celebrities that were all about it are
a little less willing to you know, come right out
and say this is something that I do.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
So then I guess the question is also is this
a fad, right or is this just society adjusting to
this treatment. You know, we're not the kind of people
who take pleasure in, you know, mocking other people are
ridiculing their choices. As far as we're concerned, I think
you speak for both of us here. If you're not
hurting somebody, then do do as you will. You know,
(21:46):
I wouldn't want to bully anybody for making a choice
about their body that made them feel comfortable, confident, et cetera.
But it is strange, and I don't think most people
know that this all goes back to one guy in
the eighteen hundreds who said, what's wrong with all this sausage?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yep? And that tainted to meet you know is big,
big money. Despite this backlash we talked about, Allergan reported
that in twenty sixteen they finished with a seven percent
rise in net revenues and that is attributed to three
point nine billion in fourth quarter sales.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Holy smokes, Well, I feel like it would be a
little bit too personal question to ask you, nol or
u Casey if you would get this kind of stuff,
So I'll go out and say it. By the I
think by the time that I am like elderly, I'll
probably just be able to download myself into a robot
(22:48):
or to get some sort of crisper level genetic treatment.
So I don't know how long the age of plastic
surgery is going to exist. In general.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I totally agree Ben, I look forward to slash year.
When that day comes. I just want to rattle off,
real quick a couple of the other products that Allergan pedals.
Leading of course the list is Botox, followed by Restasis, Oser, DECKX, lenses, Vrailar, Viberzi, Kaybella.
(23:18):
I know Caybella. I think I've seen that commercial, no
idea what it does, and Lostren.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
These sound like if I'm living in some sort of
he man Masters of the universe world. This sounds like
this is my traveling crew of adventurers Gorilla.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Come hither a busy See.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
I think it works. I know it's it's a tough job.
But whenever I hear about naming cars or naming drugs,
I always think, whose job is that? Who sits there
and goes proton?
Speaker 4 (23:56):
No?
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Wait, Britonica, you know that seems like a pretty sweet gig.
If you have that job, please write to us let
us know if you're taking suggestions.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Ho ho what thither?
Speaker 3 (24:09):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
No? I think I think I remember this noise? Do
you remember this?
Speaker 2 (24:15):
It's not a good noise. Okay, I guess it's time.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
It's time, gentlemen, Jonathan Strickland, the Quistor, you've returned yet again.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
I am back. I am back to quiz you on
things that may or may not have happened. And of course,
as we all know, it is your duty to, within
the span of three minutes, determine whether the nonsense I
spout is real or if I just made it up.
(24:46):
Thease at tire of your games, Quista, too bad Noll,
for this has become a permanent segment. Sporadically throughout the
course of this podcast. And so let's see, I gotta
come up with an our betrayriy rule. Why know we're
talking sausages today, are we not?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Yes, round, So at.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
The beginning of every question you have for me within
the span of those three minutes, once the timer begins,
you must proceed your request with please, sir, can I
have some more?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Oh boy? Okay, and we have to have to try.
You need to.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Twist your oliver as hard as you can. Sounds pain's
that's what makes the voice so high bitched.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
This is gonna be cartoonishly cognate.
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Yes, that's right. Well, it's because it's because the query
I have the quandary. If you will the stuff what
I might have made up all might be true, happens
to be of English origin. Are you prepared to hear
the scenario?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
We are prepared, all right.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
There's a fist bump happening right in front of me.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
We even blew it up.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
It's extremely insulting to do that on an audio podcast,
but we will continue. Nonetheless. I will signal to you,
Master Bolan, to pull the giant lever on our timekeeping device, which,
as we have previously established, takes up the entire back
wall of this studio.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
And most of the budget.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
All right, Yeah, it's a long one, so don't I'll
point to you when it's time. These are getting longer
each day. Listen, you left me with a lot of
time on my hands to kind of put this together.
And I mean, I'm saying it's equal blame here. All right,
let's get on with it.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Here we go.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
In the UK, sausages are sometimes called bangers, as in
the famous dish Bangers and mash. But why bangers? Well
it is because in the early nineteenth century, before English
law forced s laughter houses oh wait, no slaughter houses
(26:55):
to relocate far away from urban centers, the denizens of
old London Town could hear the sound of the abattoir
workers striking livestock over the head with a blunt instrument
in preparation for the slaughter. The sausages produced by the
packing industry then took on the name bangers, and the
(27:16):
nickname stuck even as the slaughterhouses were forced to relocate
further away. By the mid eighteen hundreds, a.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Begin getting running started.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
WHOA okay, we're going So I always just assumed that
it was because sausages are like tied together and if
you like walked with them, they would bang together.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Oh you eat some crazy rock car sausages.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
No, like you know, they they come on like a string.
You got a string of sausages and like if you
could sling them over your shoulder and as you walk,
they would bang together.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Right ba sa more close enough? Go ahead?
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Whatever? That was beautiful?
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Good?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
All right? So, so in what time period did this occur?
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Early eighteen hundreds. By the mid eighteen hundreds, the UK
passed laws that forced slaughterhouses away from urban centers for
cleanliness issues. Please, sir, may I have some more you
may know?
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Oh I don't have anything.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Oh well that's fine, consider yourself at hope I do.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
I am really, I'm really tempted to say true. One
thing that's making me question it is that it would
be strange for the food manufacturers to use that name.
I could see the street level.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
Oh this was the nickname that people adopted for the sausages.
It wasn't marketed as bankers.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
But why not call a stake a banger then, you know,
or like a hot club track? Yeah, that's different. How
you know that that wasn't until many many years later.
That's what we call bangers now is like a really
tight track.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Casey could have a gunshot in airhorn. That is the
best use for us. Yeah, all right, so I I'm
gonna I'm gonna hazard true. Really okay, what are you thinking?
Speaker 2 (29:12):
I'm thinking false? Because I really do feel like the
Bangers is like that they bang together? So shall we
shall we flip for it?
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Roachambo roachimbo deathmatch one two three shoot.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
And we're supposed to call out what what we what?
We shot?
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Okay? Okay, ready, one two three brock Sorry, okay.
Speaker 2 (29:31):
You want you beat me?
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So you're going with true?
Speaker 1 (29:33):
We're going with true. We're locking it in doing a row.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
You have fallen to the mastery of.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
The Quizta Himbo always seems like such a good idea,
but I really think we should talk these through the
cool mistress Rochambo.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Oh, I feel so good.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
I'm a little peeved at you, though, Ben I gotta says.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I have a little peeve to you. What I feel
like you should be better at rock paper scissors. We
play it all the time.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
I'm sitting in a big bowl of mashed potatoes as
Bangers and mash right, whoa right in.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
The potato yeah, I'm a little peeved in meat.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
Would you like to hear where the term bangers really
came from?
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yes? Please?
Speaker 3 (30:17):
It was a century later during World War One, which
at the time they did not call World War One
because they were optimists and just called the Great War.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Yeah, they didn't know there was gonna be a sequel.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
No one had looked at the trailers. World War One,
there was a meat shortage in the UK, and so
sometimes the packers, the meat packers would make up the
difference in the lack of meat with a little extra
water content and sausages, which are of course tied off
in casings. You put a case filled with water, a
(30:51):
water tight case on a hot surface. The water expands,
sometimes causing the case to rupture, resulting in a banging noise.
And that is why they're called bangers.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Because they would like pop. Yes, it's from the popping
noise of Well, I was wrong too then, so I
feel better now, I mean I wasn't. I did say false,
but my explanation was not quite honest.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
You never know, You never know. Also, just in case
you are curious, the captive bolt pistol was invented in
nineteen o three in Germany.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Don't care.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Oh I thought, I didn't think it was a bolt pistol.
I was picturing the hammer.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Right, No, I said blood instrument. That's why I specifically
looked up with pistol created.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Well, it looks like now we are in a dead
heat overall, right, because for two we are two for two.
So the next one is going to be decisive for
all the means.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
I cannot wait. But it's going to be another one
about bodies.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Look, man, we have sure, we have some trends here,
but we vary the show we like. You know, we
just also did a great episode on vitamin donuts. It's true.
Speaker 3 (31:57):
I have no response to that, none at all.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
That's a first.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
I'm just waiting for you to wrap this up so
I can so I can.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Leave, crawl back into your corner.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
I'm just so, I'm so tired of this room.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
He's got a little palette here with like candles and stuff.
Is thats how you read your fake history stories by candlelight?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Yes, I read my fake history stories by candle.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
You've got a weather picture stuck up with a thumbtack.
I think it's a dog from the fifties. Is that
stock photography.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Is my aunt.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Oh okay, So on that note, let's hope that we
have only lost the battle and not the war in
our continuing conflict with the villainous quist Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
You're here in the meantime. If you'd like to send
us some words of comfort, as we are both emotionally
shattered right now. You can write to us at Ridiculous
at HowStuffWorks dot com. You can also, you know, send
us an e card or a nice gift and post
it on Ridiculous History on Facebook book. You can talk
to us on Instagram. We're going to try to do
(33:02):
a better job of being part of this online community,
and we're going to do that soon in the form
of our first ever Facebook Live.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Yes, the rumors that we just started are true, ladies
and gentlemen, We are indeed going to be Facebook Live
and direct with a Ridiculous History family, and we'd love
to we'd love to meet you irl sort of, So
drop bys a toss us alike, ask us some weird questions,
(33:33):
and be prepared for some strange answers.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
When is that going to be? Do we do we
know yet? Are we just kind of floating the idea?
Out there and then well we'll nail down the date.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
We're planting the seed, planning the seed.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
I'm just excited for everyone to finally see the quist's
amazing costumes.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
That's definitely gonna.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Happen, that's true.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
We just things I'm going to have to start working
on right away. I'm going to be there.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
So how will our first Facebook live turn out? There
are several ways to find out, but you want to
watch it live and we'll let you know exactly when
that's happening in an upcoming episode.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Until then, we'd love to shout out our super producer
Casey Pegram, our pal Alex Williams, who composed our theme,
and regular contributor Lori L. Dove, who wrote How Stuff
Works article Toxic German sausages are responsible for botox.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
And most importantly, we'd like to thank you for tuning
in giving us a listen and follow up on that
recommendation from my excellent co host there Don't be a Stranger.
Hit us up. We'd love to hear from you. You
can write to us directly at Ridiculous at HowStuffWorks dot com.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
See you next time.
Speaker 3 (34:39):
Send more fanmail for the quizter
Speaker 2 (34:50):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hey, no confession time, man, what you know, we're getting
on in years and I'm just wondering, have you or
Max ever considered botox?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
I don't think you need Thank you, thank you for
that caveat. I'm gonna say it's not for me. I know,
shade or grudge against anyone that feels like that's something
that will improve their self image or self esteem. But
it's just never been something that I found to be
of interest to me personally.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
I was startled to read. I'm right, they often look startled.
Folks do what you will, you know, as long as
it's something positive and it makes you happy. But if
somebody came to me and they said, Ben, you need botox,
it would kind of send me on a spiral.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Just to be honest, absolutely, And you know I mean
in this are very public facing day and age where
folks are judged for their looks on the regular people
who are public figures at the pressure to look your
best or whatever. But it turns out the origins of
this kind of thing, what is the word I believe batcha, Yeah,
(01:08):
that's right, are very unusual and dare we say ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Yeah, this may give you a pause, but we think
it's a very fascinating and ridiculous origin story. And obviously,
like you're saying, we're not taking potshots for anybody who
was doing botox or similar procedures, but I think it
is important in an age of social media and everybody
(01:35):
being to some degree of public figure, it's important to
realize that there can be dangers to that because people
have been getting botox at younger and younger ages, which
you know, not to sound like an old fogy, but
I would be you know, were I a parent, I
would be a little concerned if I had like a
college or a high school aged kid who came to
(01:57):
me and said, Dad, for Christmas or whatever, I want
my birthday or something, I want botox.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
I will say.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
I have a friend who she gets botox injections very
not very uncommonly, and what she always says is like
if you just do it a little bit, and so
they tell you like a little bit, like you know,
helps out. But like when you see those uh, you know,
the celebrities with the uh terror faces, probably uh that's
because they've just going way too hard. And like you know,
(02:30):
she was talking to me about I'm like, okay, that
doesn't like, that's a different way of thinking about it
from what how I've always.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Thought about something with moderation, right.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Well, I mean, it's no accident that the tox part
of botox uh is in there, because the baculinum toxin,
which has often been referred to as a miracle poison,
is in fact an incredibly poisonous biological material that in
small doses and when injected in the face, can cause
(03:01):
paralysis that is sort of desirable. I guess that causes
like wrinkles to be smoothed out and stuff. And again
to your point, Max, people that get it maybe a
little too frequently can have paralysis that is a little
bit more striking, let's just say.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And then there's I mean, also it ties into very
real problematic things like body dysmorphia, issues with self image.
But we think, regardless of your stance on botox personally
or philosophically, folks, we think you too will be amazed
to learn in today's classic episode the provenance of this treatment.
(03:40):
It comes not necessarily from the world of medicine so
much as one man's unending obsession with food safety and rotting.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Pork exactly, blood sausage even which was a very popular
delicacy and of Wutcheenberg, Germany in the late seventeen nineties
vill bod which is now known as Boden excuse me,
as you said, Wurtemberg Wurtenberg in Germany. There was a
(04:12):
rash of sickenings that came about due to a particular
batch of pork sausage, a rash of sickenings, a rash
of sickenings, and because of that, it was discovered that
this toxin that was created due to essentially food spoiling,
(04:32):
had some unintended side effects that were then kind of
co opted and used for something completely different.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So let's get into the tail. Ridiculous History is a
production of iHeartRadio, Friends and Neighbors. Whether you have frown lines,
(05:15):
cruise feet, or a face that is uncannily plump and
baby smooth, we'd like to welcome you to the show.
My name is Ben, my.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Name is Nolan. Ben. I couldn't help, but notice you
got a little bag and sag in action going on
under those eyes. They're gonna shoot some sausage poison up
in there to help you out.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Well. I appreciate you using it by its real name
I'm going for more of like a haggard investigator, dangerous
cop on you know, off the res. Yeah, I'm doing
like a cerproco thing. I'm working up toward it. But
it's true. I don't know if everybody noticed what Noel
just said. You called it sausage poisones.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Sausage poison, my friend, don't I have a syringe of
it right here on the ready.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
No, riddle me, riddle me this snole before you stab
me in the face with this. Where's this sausage poison
thing coming from? Is there another name.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
For that, the sausage Poison Party?
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I would buy that album.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Let's oh yeah, that sounds like fun. Yeah, well, no,
it's it's it's you know, a sausage poisoned by any
other name is still sausage poison. But we know and
love it today as a little thing called botox that
has taken the fashion and celebrity world by storm.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
I'm going to tell you about something that we didn't
talk about off air, but it really creeped me out,
and I'm going to keep the names out of it
out of respect for these people. So I know someone
who is a dude in his early twenties who has
had multiple botox injections?
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Is it Jonathan Strickland, it is, it is?
Speaker 1 (06:55):
I don't know if it's I don't think it's Jonathan. No,
I don't know of anybody, any of our coworkers who
are botox fans. But it is an increasingly common procedure,
right and it's it used to be something that people
would just most Americans would just hear about on television.
(07:16):
But now that you know, when I learned that this
this guy I know is getting botox injections in his
early twenties noll and he says he has to have them,
it hit me how common this procedure is becoming.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
And just you know, disclaim it right up front, utterly,
no shade, do do what you want to do, Do
what makes you feel good.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
It's your body.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
It's totally your body. But yeah, and I said, you know,
the fashion and world of celebrity was taken by storm,
but it is totally trickled down to us, you know,
every day folk. And like there are botox parties you
can have, Like people will go to gym's and set
up a little botox station because it's an easy, little
quick procedure it's just as rans that's loaded with this
stuff that is a processed form of back to heia
(08:00):
that actually gives you botulism. And we talked about sausage
poison because, as it turns out, the guy that discovered
this stuff found it in a batch of bad blood
sausages in Germany in the early eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
That's right. We can trace the success and prevalence of
what is called botox today to the discovery made by
this physician, Justinus Kerner, who, as Noel said, encountered a
batch of dangerous sausage sausage gone wrong in the early
eighteen hundreds. What Kerner discovered specifically were the spores of
(08:40):
something called Clustridium buchulinium microbes.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Yeah, and as it turns out, there were multiple strains
of it that were discovered. One in particular is what
has become used widely as botox because it has the
property of relaxing muscles. So you know, if you have
these lines in your face and then you inject this stuff,
it relaxes the muscle and causes the lines to kind
of disappear. And it's interesting because this scientist, as was
(09:08):
sort of practice in the day, he didn't have anybody
to try this stuff out on, so he just shot
himself up with it and literally, like a thing that
he knew was poisoning sickening people, he just decided, well,
maybe might find something interesting out here, and he started
injecting it in himself, and he discovered some pretty interesting properties.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Right, And we do have to say, in Kerner's defense,
his bona fides come thusly before he experimented on himself.
This is a quote from our friend Laurie L.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Dove.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
He rigorously tested hundreds of sausages to find these different
varieties of bachulism or bachelim toxin, and it turns out
that it was pretty common to have dodgy sausage in
Germany at this time because there were, you know, lower
standards of food safety, to be honest. And eventually this
(10:03):
led to something that sounds hilarious but is tragic and real,
which was, you know, scores of people dying due to
sausage poisoning outbreaks. This inspired Kerner. He worked himself up
to self experimentation, which sounds so crazy today, but you're
absolutely right, and he discovered it had this muscle relaxing
(10:25):
effect that you had mentioned and that it was not
fatal and that it could alter appearance to a degree.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
That's right. In addition to that muscle relaxing effect, it
also could cause vision problems, problems swallowing, vomiting, and severe
weakness of muscles when just used directly or experienced ingesting
it through the tainted food. And Kerner actually came up
with a pretty clever name for this stuff. He called
(10:52):
it worst Gifts, which means sausage poison. But I think
that as a sausage present.
Speaker 1 (11:00):
Go there we go. But then the evolution of botox
applications continues for decades, right, and there's a big breakthrough
about seventy years after Kerner.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
It also involved tainted food. In this case, it was
a bespoiled ham that was brought to a funeral talking
about adding insult to injury. Some people died, actually three
people died and twenty three people were paralyzed by this
tainted ham. And a doctor by the name of Emiel
(11:32):
Pierre van Airmingham of Belgium had to investigate this botulism outbreak.
And it's interesting he actually studied under Robert Koch, doctor
Robert Coke, who found out about anthrax and tuberculosis and
cholera bacterial cause. So the bacterial causes exactly, and Airmingham
(11:54):
was able to make the connection between botulism and that
spore we talked about that he called Bacillis botulinus and
it was later renamed Claustridium botulinium.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
And this is a watershed moment for this science because
in the years afterwards people were able to identify more
strains of Baculinum talks and eventually arriving at seven total,
four of which could actually cause illness in human beings.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
That's right, And we're getting some of this info from
a great article on NBC News called Frozen in Time.
Botox over the years, from bad sausage to brow raiserre
a poisonous path to pretty That is some good alliterations,
good title. It's neat though, too, because as we move
into the forties and World War two, folks were experimenting
(12:50):
with this stuff as like a serious chemical weapon.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Yeah. According to a two thousand and four article in
Clinical Medicine by the it's the Journal of the Royal
College of Physicians in London, there was a plan on
the US side to have Chinese sex workers slip tiny
pills into the food or drink of high ranking Japanese
(13:15):
officers in the hope that this would prove fatal. They
got far enough to actually make the capsules, but they
never put it into action. But yeah, as Noel said,
they were actively planning to weaponize it. And now you know,
you can have a party and put a version of
it in your face.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
And that stuff you put in your face is the
Bauchulinium talks and type A. Because in the sixties and
seventies the research into that in particular was accelerated and
it was meant to help with muscle disorders. There was
a doctor by the name of Alan B. Scott of
the Smith Kettlewell Eye Research Foundation in San Francisco, who
(13:57):
did animal studies with that ty a, and he hypothesized
that you could actually use this stuff to help cure
people who had crossed eyes, cross eyed people who were
cross eyed. There's an official name for that. It is
called strabismus. I was not aware of that, and it
is a type of quote ophthalmic dystonia. And they found
(14:20):
that when injecting this stuff into the muscles around the
afflicted eyes, it loosened them up and caused them to
go straight.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
So now we see the transformation from a poison in
your sausage or you're what was the phrases, bespoiled ham
I like that, to a weapon of war or would
be weapon of war, to something that may, it turns out,
have health benefits. In nineteen seventy eight, doctor Allan Scott
(14:50):
gets FDA approval to inject more, you know, to experiment
on people with bachulinum toxin.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
And he trademarked it as acu Linum, and that was
the name of the company that he incorporated with that patent, and.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
By the late eighties drug makers were paying attention. A
manufacturer named Allergan purchased oculinum or or purchased rather, let's
be technical here, purchased the rights to distribute it, and
then the FDA approved this not just for strabismus, as
Noel mentioned, but also for spasms of the eyelid muscle
(15:26):
better known as bleferos spasms.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
And it wasn't long after Allergan acquired this serum that
they also got approval from the FDA to changed the name.
I didn't realize that was a thing. I guess it
makes sense because he can't be you know. That's why
the names of pharmaceuticals are often a little dull, because
I think they have to have some aspect in them
that ties to the actual substance, the actual material that's
(15:51):
in the product.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Can't call things smile pills, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
And they changed it to botox, which was a fun
portmanteau of batchy line toxin type A botox.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
Now here we are. We've gone through the discovery of
this stuff, the application of it, and the various uses
people tried to find for it that didn't quite work out,
like a weapon of war. Again, thank goodness, we went
with some health benefits instead, and very impressed. Good on
you human species. So the big question that is, how
(16:29):
did we get from how do we get from this
sausage poison to a wrinkle treatment? Right? It occurs in
the nineties when a Canadian ophthalmologist named doctor Jing Carruthers
notices that her patients with eye spasms are starting to
lose their frown lines, which is a specific type of
(16:52):
line on the face that comes with aging.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Right, It's like, oh, my goodness, Louise, not only is
I not twitching anymore, you also have taken on a
new youthful glow and because that's how people talked in
the nineties in Canada.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Yeah, yes, yes, these are accurate reenactments. And in nineteen
ninety two, doctor Caruthers, along with her husband, who was
a dermatologist, published a study that noted this C. Bauchulinum,
a exotoxin could be used to treat brow wrinkles, and
they had no idea about how quickly the rest of
(17:28):
the world would catch on, so dermatologists across North America
took note in the United States as well. By nineteen
ninety seven, botox used for wrinkles had spiked to the
point that Canada ran out and people began to panic.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
And it's like, you know, I have a pretty distinct
memory of like when you started hearing about botox, and
it wasn't for me anyway until the early two thousands.
And that's because the FDA in the United States didn't
give Allergan approval to use bow talks for that application
that the Canadians were so fond of already until two
(18:05):
thousand and two, and that's when they were able to
get that approval for the temporary improvement of appearance of
moderate to severe glabellar lines or those vertical frown lines
between your brow that you know, folks are wont to
get rid of.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
You hear them called worry lines, worry.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Lines, and this is not only this is in men
and women, and they can start to form as early
as like nineteen or twenty years old.
Speaker 1 (18:33):
This was a genuine treatment for something that a lot
of people were very insecure about. You know, people wanted
these wrinkles gone. And the FDA we keep issuing approval
for different uses, right, and botox became amazingly popular. I
think you and I and super producer Casey all remember
(18:58):
the glut of advertising. Right. It started to show up
in fictional shows too. Somebody would get botox. Right. You
started to see advertisements for it in malls, in gyms,
and it would be called the you know, the beauty
secret in the health mags or the different lifestyle magazines.
And then of course, inevitably knockoffs come into play, right,
(19:23):
which leads to one of my favorite phrases that we
found here. Photos photos that's rough. That's rough.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
It is like baby.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Laxative, like what I don't know, But I am not
a photos authority, thank goodness, but we do also have
to caution against using some kind of thing like that.
Did somebody make homegrown botulism? Did they just get the
right kind of stuff to grow?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
And some bad sausages do it in a petri dish
and in their closet.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
That's that's that's not a good look now.
Speaker 2 (19:56):
But a lot of people in the United States, a
lot of a lot of people did seem to think
that botox was a good look, despite like seven hundred
percent since the early two thousands, and that's according to
the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. But that number is
only tied to that cosmetic use. And as we've already
(20:17):
been through, quite a few other uses for this toxin
that are under review currently or actually in practice, and
that includes the treatment of cerebral palsy, a condition that
involves severely contracted muscles, so it makes sense that you
could use this to ease those spasms.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
It also has success with easy muscle spasms from multiple sclerosis,
or and this surprised me, treating migraines.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
But as with anything that you know, experiences such a
meteoric rise so quickly, there's there's a backlash sometimes right
and in that timeline on NBC they talk about this
botox backlash and terms you know, thrown around.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Like poker face and joker face.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
And the idea that it's just a little too available
and maybe people are doing it a little too willy
nilly and not thinking about maybe some of the side effects,
and even some celebrities that were all about it are
a little less willing to you know, come right out
and say this is something that I do.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
So then I guess the question is also is this
a fad, right or is this just society adjusting to
this treatment. You know, we're not the kind of people
who take pleasure in, you know, mocking other people are
ridiculing their choices. As far as we're concerned, I think
you speak for both of us here. If you're not
hurting somebody, then do do as you will. You know,
(21:46):
I wouldn't want to bully anybody for making a choice
about their body that made them feel comfortable, confident, et cetera.
But it is strange, and I don't think most people
know that this all goes back to one guy in
the eighteen hundreds who said, what's wrong with all this sausage?
Speaker 2 (22:06):
Yep? And that tainted to meet you know is big,
big money. Despite this backlash we talked about, Allergan reported
that in twenty sixteen they finished with a seven percent
rise in net revenues and that is attributed to three
point nine billion in fourth quarter sales.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Holy smokes, Well, I feel like it would be a
little bit too personal question to ask you, nol or
u Casey if you would get this kind of stuff,
So I'll go out and say it. By the I
think by the time that I am like elderly, I'll
probably just be able to download myself into a robot
(22:48):
or to get some sort of crisper level genetic treatment.
So I don't know how long the age of plastic
surgery is going to exist. In general.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I totally agree Ben, I look forward to slash year.
When that day comes. I just want to rattle off,
real quick a couple of the other products that Allergan pedals.
Leading of course the list is Botox, followed by Restasis, Oser, DECKX, lenses, Vrailar, Viberzi, Kaybella.
(23:18):
I know Caybella. I think I've seen that commercial, no
idea what it does, and Lostren.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
These sound like if I'm living in some sort of
he man Masters of the universe world. This sounds like
this is my traveling crew of adventurers Gorilla.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Come hither a busy See.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
I think it works. I know it's it's a tough job.
But whenever I hear about naming cars or naming drugs,
I always think, whose job is that? Who sits there
and goes proton?
Speaker 4 (23:56):
No?
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Wait, Britonica, you know that seems like a pretty sweet gig.
If you have that job, please write to us let
us know if you're taking suggestions.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Ho ho what thither?
Speaker 3 (24:09):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
No? I think I think I remember this noise? Do
you remember this?
Speaker 2 (24:15):
It's not a good noise. Okay, I guess it's time.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
It's time, gentlemen, Jonathan Strickland, the Quistor, you've returned yet again.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
I am back. I am back to quiz you on
things that may or may not have happened. And of course,
as we all know, it is your duty to, within
the span of three minutes, determine whether the nonsense I
spout is real or if I just made it up.
(24:46):
Thease at tire of your games, Quista, too bad Noll,
for this has become a permanent segment. Sporadically throughout the
course of this podcast. And so let's see, I gotta
come up with an our betrayriy rule. Why know we're
talking sausages today, are we not?
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Yes, round, So at.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
The beginning of every question you have for me within
the span of those three minutes, once the timer begins,
you must proceed your request with please, sir, can I
have some more?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Oh boy? Okay, and we have to have to try.
You need to.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Twist your oliver as hard as you can. Sounds pain's
that's what makes the voice so high bitched.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
This is gonna be cartoonishly cognate.
Speaker 3 (25:33):
Yes, that's right. Well, it's because it's because the query
I have the quandary. If you will the stuff what
I might have made up all might be true, happens
to be of English origin. Are you prepared to hear
the scenario?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
We are prepared, all right.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
There's a fist bump happening right in front of me.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
We even blew it up.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
It's extremely insulting to do that on an audio podcast,
but we will continue. Nonetheless. I will signal to you,
Master Bolan, to pull the giant lever on our timekeeping device, which,
as we have previously established, takes up the entire back
wall of this studio.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
And most of the budget.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
All right, Yeah, it's a long one, so don't I'll
point to you when it's time. These are getting longer
each day. Listen, you left me with a lot of
time on my hands to kind of put this together.
And I mean, I'm saying it's equal blame here. All right,
let's get on with it.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Here we go.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
In the UK, sausages are sometimes called bangers, as in
the famous dish Bangers and mash. But why bangers? Well
it is because in the early nineteenth century, before English
law forced s laughter houses oh wait, no slaughter houses
(26:55):
to relocate far away from urban centers, the denizens of
old London Town could hear the sound of the abattoir
workers striking livestock over the head with a blunt instrument
in preparation for the slaughter. The sausages produced by the
packing industry then took on the name bangers, and the
(27:16):
nickname stuck even as the slaughterhouses were forced to relocate
further away. By the mid eighteen hundreds, a.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Begin getting running started.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
WHOA okay, we're going So I always just assumed that
it was because sausages are like tied together and if
you like walked with them, they would bang together.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Oh you eat some crazy rock car sausages.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
No, like you know, they they come on like a string.
You got a string of sausages and like if you
could sling them over your shoulder and as you walk,
they would bang together.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Right ba sa more close enough? Go ahead?
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Whatever? That was beautiful?
Speaker 3 (27:55):
Good?
Speaker 1 (27:55):
All right? So, so in what time period did this occur?
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Early eighteen hundreds. By the mid eighteen hundreds, the UK
passed laws that forced slaughterhouses away from urban centers for
cleanliness issues. Please, sir, may I have some more you
may know?
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Oh I don't have anything.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Oh well that's fine, consider yourself at hope I do.
Speaker 1 (28:20):
I am really, I'm really tempted to say true. One
thing that's making me question it is that it would
be strange for the food manufacturers to use that name.
I could see the street level.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
Oh this was the nickname that people adopted for the sausages.
It wasn't marketed as bankers.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
But why not call a stake a banger then, you know,
or like a hot club track? Yeah, that's different. How
you know that that wasn't until many many years later.
That's what we call bangers now is like a really
tight track.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Casey could have a gunshot in airhorn. That is the
best use for us. Yeah, all right, so I I'm
gonna I'm gonna hazard true. Really okay, what are you thinking?
Speaker 2 (29:12):
I'm thinking false? Because I really do feel like the
Bangers is like that they bang together? So shall we
shall we flip for it?
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Roachambo roachimbo deathmatch one two three shoot.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
And we're supposed to call out what what we what?
We shot?
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Okay? Okay, ready, one two three brock Sorry, okay.
Speaker 2 (29:31):
You want you beat me?
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So you're going with true?
Speaker 1 (29:33):
We're going with true. We're locking it in doing a row.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
You have fallen to the mastery of.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
The Quizta Himbo always seems like such a good idea,
but I really think we should talk these through the
cool mistress Rochambo.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Oh, I feel so good.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
I'm a little peeved at you, though, Ben I gotta says.
Speaker 1 (29:55):
I have a little peeve to you. What I feel
like you should be better at rock paper scissors. We
play it all the time.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
I'm sitting in a big bowl of mashed potatoes as
Bangers and mash right, whoa right in.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
The potato yeah, I'm a little peeved in meat.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
Would you like to hear where the term bangers really
came from?
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yes? Please?
Speaker 3 (30:17):
It was a century later during World War One, which
at the time they did not call World War One
because they were optimists and just called the Great War.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Yeah, they didn't know there was gonna be a sequel.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
No one had looked at the trailers. World War One,
there was a meat shortage in the UK, and so
sometimes the packers, the meat packers would make up the
difference in the lack of meat with a little extra
water content and sausages, which are of course tied off
in casings. You put a case filled with water, a
(30:51):
water tight case on a hot surface. The water expands,
sometimes causing the case to rupture, resulting in a banging noise.
And that is why they're called bangers.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Because they would like pop. Yes, it's from the popping
noise of Well, I was wrong too then, so I
feel better now, I mean I wasn't. I did say false,
but my explanation was not quite honest.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
You never know, You never know. Also, just in case
you are curious, the captive bolt pistol was invented in
nineteen o three in Germany.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Don't care.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Oh I thought, I didn't think it was a bolt pistol.
I was picturing the hammer.
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Right, No, I said blood instrument. That's why I specifically
looked up with pistol created.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Well, it looks like now we are in a dead
heat overall, right, because for two we are two for two.
So the next one is going to be decisive for
all the means.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
I cannot wait. But it's going to be another one
about bodies.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Look, man, we have sure, we have some trends here,
but we vary the show we like. You know, we
just also did a great episode on vitamin donuts. It's true.
Speaker 3 (31:57):
I have no response to that, none at all.
Speaker 2 (32:01):
That's a first.
Speaker 3 (32:03):
I'm just waiting for you to wrap this up so
I can so I can.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Leave, crawl back into your corner.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
I'm just so, I'm so tired of this room.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
He's got a little palette here with like candles and stuff.
Is thats how you read your fake history stories by candlelight?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Yes, I read my fake history stories by candle.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
You've got a weather picture stuck up with a thumbtack.
I think it's a dog from the fifties. Is that
stock photography.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Is my aunt.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Oh okay, So on that note, let's hope that we
have only lost the battle and not the war in
our continuing conflict with the villainous quist Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
You're here in the meantime. If you'd like to send
us some words of comfort, as we are both emotionally
shattered right now. You can write to us at Ridiculous
at HowStuffWorks dot com. You can also, you know, send
us an e card or a nice gift and post
it on Ridiculous History on Facebook book. You can talk
to us on Instagram. We're going to try to do
(33:02):
a better job of being part of this online community,
and we're going to do that soon in the form
of our first ever Facebook Live.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Yes, the rumors that we just started are true, ladies
and gentlemen, We are indeed going to be Facebook Live
and direct with a Ridiculous History family, and we'd love
to we'd love to meet you irl sort of, So
drop bys a toss us alike, ask us some weird questions,
(33:33):
and be prepared for some strange answers.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
When is that going to be? Do we do we
know yet? Are we just kind of floating the idea?
Out there and then well we'll nail down the date.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
We're planting the seed, planning the seed.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
I'm just excited for everyone to finally see the quist's
amazing costumes.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
That's definitely gonna.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Happen, that's true.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
We just things I'm going to have to start working
on right away. I'm going to be there.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
So how will our first Facebook live turn out? There
are several ways to find out, but you want to
watch it live and we'll let you know exactly when
that's happening in an upcoming episode.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
Until then, we'd love to shout out our super producer
Casey Pegram, our pal Alex Williams, who composed our theme,
and regular contributor Lori L. Dove, who wrote How Stuff
Works article Toxic German sausages are responsible for botox.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
And most importantly, we'd like to thank you for tuning
in giving us a listen and follow up on that
recommendation from my excellent co host there Don't be a Stranger.
Hit us up. We'd love to hear from you. You
can write to us directly at Ridiculous at HowStuffWorks dot com.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
See you next time.
Speaker 3 (34:39):
Send more fanmail for the quizter
Speaker 2 (34:50):
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
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