April 26, 2025 • 33 mins
During the battle of the Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War, the First Marine Division seemed doomed. Surrounded, outnumbered, outgunned and running dangerously low on ammunition, the Marines called for an airdrop of ammo only to receive... pallets of tootsie rolls. Over the next two bloody, violent weeks these tiny candies turned out be much more useful than anyone could have predicted -- tune in to learn why some Marines credit their survival to this oft-maligned, strange piece of candy in this week's Classic episode.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Fellow ridiculous historians, we return to you, uh treats in hand,
(00:05):
just like our good friends at Sweetwater with a classic
episode I.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Love war and Candy. Yeah, oh wait, no, I smell it,
I smell water, I smell sex, can smell sex. Yeah,
that's right, that was the ref got was that Marcy's
playground or just marcie playground? I don't think it's possessive. Yeah, yeah,
you might be right. You might be right.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
It's a it's a banger, though, but we are kind
of talking about candy, and I think in this classic episode,
the infamous Toutsy roll air Drop, we also air some
of our opinions about scrumptious treats.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Is this the one where y'all gang up on me
over Almond Joy? No, that's the one we did recently. Okay, well,
I stand by it. All Enjoy is you're still on
the almonds. I'm on the Almond Joy Baby, Mounds can
take it or leave Almonds Joy, give me all you got.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Shung Wing this stand up cop that I absolutely love.
He has a Netflix special wherein he has an extended
rant about Almond Joy and Mounds, and I think that's
a person who will speak to you on a spiritual level.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Yeah, well, Allmond Joy's got nuts, mounds don't. But during
the Battle of Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War, the
First Marine Division seemed absolutely doomed. There were no nuts
about it.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
Yes, yeah, And a lot of times in the modern day,
especially people in the West, we forget just how close
the Korean War came to a total victory for North
Korean forces before the before the temporary peace was achieved,
(01:45):
the peace that exists today. The war has not officially ended.
So we're going to travel back there with you folks. Surrounded, outnumbered,
out gunned, running low on every imaginable supply, the US
Marines call for it air drop of AMMO, a life
saving reup, and instead of getting AMMO for guns, they
(02:09):
get what we could call AMMO for Halloween. They get
Totsy rolls.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Man, AMMO for the gaps between your teeth and your molars. Yeah, Tootsio,
you probably load those things up into some sort of blunderbus,
you know, shoot them at people. Those things were seriously dense,
But it turns out they were good for quite a
bit more than maybe was anticipated. And this serendipitous there
we say, fortuitous air drop mix up kind of had
(02:39):
a silver lining.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
To it, exactly yes, and oh gosh, I look back
on this one fondly. I can't believe this was all
the way back in twenty eighteen, but it holds up.
No spoilers, folks, Let's roll the tape. Oh, can we
totsy roll the tape? Let's totsy roll the tape. Yeah,
ridiculous histories of reduction of iHeartRadio. A young hasio fellow,
(03:27):
ridiculous historians. Welcome to the show. That is my poorly
pronounced attempt at saying hello in Korean, or one version of.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Hello, Hello to you, Ben. My name is.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Nolan, Hello to you Nol, My name is Ben.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Yeah. Look at that. It checks out, And of course we're.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Joining as always with our super producer, Casey Pegram.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
You know, Ben, there's one thing we did not learn
how to say in Korean. Well, there's a lot of
things we didn't learn how to say in Korean, but
one of them it's tutsi role. And I wouldn't be
surprised if maybe there was one of those phonetic pronunciations.
Your girl friend showed me the other night we were
hanging out a thing that she took back from your
trip to Korea that had a phonetic pronunciation of the
word lighter. And it was just three characters, and it
(04:10):
was Laja tour, I believe, which is nonsense in Korean,
nonsense in Korean. So I'm wondering if maybe there's a
similar thing for tutsiro.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So why are we saying hello in Korean today?
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I don't know. I didn't do my homework. Can you
help me out?
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You know?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Surely? Well we were talking about, you know, the topic
is related to Korea and a particular conflict that took
place in Korea that I was woefully under educated about.
And I know Ben that you probably were more educated
about this particular situation than me. So why don't you
give us maybe your background and why this might be
the case.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Right, Noel, you and I before we went into this episode,
I think we both knew a little bit about the
conflict called the Korean War here in the States.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Yeah, just mainly from watching reruns of Mash.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Is Mash Korean War. I really I am not a
mash Burt.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
People always think it's about Vietnam because it was on
during Vietnam, but it is in fact about the Korean War,
even though it was kind of quote unquote also about Vietnam.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Casey on the case. So thanks for teaching me about Mash, Guys,
I hear. It's a great show. I've just never seen it.
Did you ever watch it?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Yeah? I didn't watch it a time, but I watched
it enough to learn a little bit about the Korean
War and also to know that the theme song of
Mash actually has lyrics in the movie, and it's a
very sad song.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Yes, suicide is painless. It's a wonderful song. It's beautiful,
but it's sad. Yeah, beautiful is probably a better word there.
So the Korean War, which is also called the Liberation
War in some places, was waged between nineteen fifty to
nineteen fifty three June nineteen fifty to July nineteen fifty three,
(05:54):
a war between what we now call the DPRK or
North Korea and the ROK or South Korea. And it
was a proxy war because there was support on the
North Korean side from Russia and there was support on
the South Korean side from the US.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
It's because it was basically the Imperial spoils of the
Second World War where Japan lost their territory, which was Korea,
and so the US and Russia kind of had to
split it up between themselves. So the US reluctantly were
sort of in charge of South Korea and Russia Communist
(06:30):
Russia was in charge of North Korea, and so it
created this divide between communism and democracy.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Right, Yes, this is a very much a Cold War
esque conflict.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
I think it's considered the first step that led to
the Cold War, right.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, yeah, in some ways it is because this was
still this is what we would call a hot war,
because there were actually weapons of war being waged. But
it very much was a symptom of this ideological conflt
that would later determine so much of geopolitics for decades.
And we could get I don't know if we should
get too far in the weeds on that one, because
(07:07):
this is kind of the backdrop for our story, but
I guess we should point out this war, in a
very real way, never actually ended. And if you go
to Korea today, you will if you visit the capital city, Soul,
you are very close to the de Militarized Zone or DMZ.
Didn't you do that thing, Ben, Yes, yeah, I did.
(07:28):
I went recently to the Republic of Korea and then
visited the DMZ, which.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Is a weird place.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It was a weird place, but it's a physical, tangible
reminder that this war, although it may sound like it
was ancient in the nineteen fifties and stuff, it still
affects the people on the peninsula and in the larger region.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I guess we didn't really fully get into what the
conflict was. We talked about how the US and Russia
inherited the Koreek Korea from Japan, but the Russian backed
I guess you could say North Korea actually invaded South Korea.
And that's what kicked off this big ideological battle because
the US as opposed to, you know, practicing appeasement or
(08:16):
something like that, because this wasn't really they didn't really
even want South Korea. It was just something they were
kind of like saddled with because of, you know, the
outcome of World War two, and they looked at this
as not just an invasion into something that they responsible for.
They looked at it as the potential match that would
light the world on fire with communists.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Right.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Yeah, So this Cold War conflict results in Korea being
split into two separate states on the peninsula. But the
problem is both of those governments consider themselves the sole
legitimate government of the entire place, so they look at
the other government not as an equal separate state. They
(08:57):
look at it as this regime that should be toppled
as soon as possible.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
And that was with under Kim Il Sung right.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Right, Kim Il Sung, the first Supreme Leader of North
Korea from its establishment in nineteen forty eight. The conflict
when it occurs becomes a war of attrition. At first,
North Korea is whipping the South Korean forces like all
(09:26):
the way down to Busson and Soul. Over the course
of the conflict changes hands multiple times. Eventually, when the
fighting actually ends and they sign an armiscice, they make
this DMZ line along the thirtieth parallel, but they never
signed a peace treaty. So even today as we record this,
(09:49):
technically the two nations are still at war, even after
the fall of the USSR.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
And ben What was it like to visit to be
in that DMZ zone. Didn't you have to watch some
kind of propaganda video. Yeah, that also explos how it
was an amazing bird sanctuary.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, it's the only part of the tour I was
not like I didn't have the option of skipping. So
you see a couple of different places. You see an
observatory tower, you see the train station that could ship
people or transport people directly to the capital of North Korea.
And you go down a very steep tunnel, an invasion tunnel.
(10:26):
There are three or four that are discovered, but there
are multiple other ones suspected to exist.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
And you see how the.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Tunnel was constructed through the DMZ and it's not a
comfortable walk, but estimates say they could carry thirty thousand
plus people through there to invade Seoul. But the one
part of the tour you cannot skip is at least
our tour guide tell us you couldn't is after you
get out of the tunnel, Chicken is a very very
steep walk. You have to watch about an eight to
(10:57):
ten minute propaganda film from the South Korean side, the
rok side, about how great the DMZ is for migratory
birds and biodiversity, which is actually that's true, and you
know it's got the whole nine of every propaganda movie
you can imagine. You can see that, like the hands
from opposite sides of the screen clasping each other, like
(11:19):
that meme that's so popular nowadays. And it's strange because
I was expecting propaganda from the North Korean side. I
was surprised how much exists on the South Korean side.
There's still very much a conflict. And today's episode takes
us back to when that was a hot war, not
just an armistice. So Noel, our story today concerns those
(11:42):
two things we mentioned. We talked a little bit about Korea,
but we teased at the top of the show Tutsi rolls,
and this is something where I wanted to check on
our mutual americanisms. I feel like for all three of us, Casey,
you and myself, tutsi roles seem like a very well
known thing.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Right.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Are they a US famous candy or a world famous candy?
Speaker 2 (12:06):
You know that's a good question, Ben, I don't know. Well,
just to be.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Safe, we can give the quick and dirty. Tutsi rolls
were invented by a guy named Leo Hirshfield, who sold
them out of a Brooklyn candy shop before he sold
the idea to a group called Stern and Solberg.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
And that could actually be an episode unto itself, because
there's a really intense, kind of tragic ending to that story.
And there is a lot of hot debate as to
whether he invented the candy and then sold it to them,
or if it was the other way around. He also
invented or he had several patents for different candy making equipment,
but he also this is probably my favorite name of
(12:47):
any product ever. Yeah, he invented a type of gelatine
that was pre jello called Bromangelon.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Bromangelon, which I think would be great on a T
shirt and a great nickname for one of those not
just nicknames like Brusve.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Yeah, exactly, Bromangelin I'm gonna use that. But anyway, a
point being, if you don't know what it's zero is,
where have you been. They're not that good. They get
stuck in your teeth. I'm not a huge fan, but
they are very tightly wrapped in these little you know,
with the ends and the little bow ends on the side.
You can also get them in like a stick form.
You know. They're much larger, and they're kind of the
(13:24):
candy that you got at Halloween that you would rather
have gotten something else.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
For me, they were acceptable, They were passable Halloween candies.
Anything was better than that orange and black wax paper taffy.
Do you guys remember that Casey is nodding. He is
so tired of that.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Yeah, it's gross.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
It's like the last stuff you eat, and you do
eat it, but it's the last thing you eat and
you feel gross afterwards.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And that's been Casey on the case part too. We're
doing them in installments now, which is important because when
you take them all together, it creates a whole picture.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
And we're going to syndicate these onto other shows. We're
just not going to tell the other shows. Casey will
pop in and hopefully it'll make sense. But Tutsi rolls,
which you know which I think you're right, are a
story all their own. Tutsi rules were also valuable, not
(14:18):
just as Halloween candy, but as World War Two rations
because just like you said, you know how, they're individually wrapped,
they have a very high temperature tolerance. It's pretty much
like chocolate wax almost, and they were seen by Uncle
Sam as a source of quick energy because they also
would remain edible for a long period of time.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
When you say energy, we're just basically talking like sugar, right, Yeah,
just full of sugars. There's no other nutritional value in
tutsi rolls.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
No, No, they're not part of a balanced diet. But yeah,
it was a burst of energy kind of thing. And
there are stories you would find about how tutsi rolls
helped soldiers, like how there was actually some fire behind
the smoke. One story is of a pilot whose plane
was shot down over the Sahara Desert and survived for
(15:08):
three days just on tutsi rolls. But today's story is
much less anecdotal, much more provable, and it's about a
group of Marines who were in a particular battle in
the Korean War.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Yeah, that battle was called the Battle of Chosin Reservoir Chosin,
which is also called chang Jen. This was one of
the first campaigns of the Korean War. It was called
the Chinese People's Volunteer Army, and they got involved because
they felt like American troops coming in to North Korea
(15:48):
was in some way encroaching on their territory. And I
was a little foggy as to why that was, because
it didn't seem like they necessarily had an axe to
grind in this particular war, and yet they made their
troops available to help the North Koreans. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
So Chinese sources refer to this battle as the eastern
part of the Second Phase Offensive. They entered the conflict
to infiltrate, as you said, part of North Korea. We
know that they were under the command of Song Shi Lun,
who had been ordered by Mao Zedong to destroy the
(16:28):
United Nations forces. We have to keep in mind that
at the time this was the United Nations was a
part of this conflict. There were I think thirty thousand
United Nations troops here and about one hundred and twenty
thousand Chinese troops who were essentially attempting to eradicate the
(16:50):
United Nations. But no, there's an article you found that
goes into a little bit more detail about this.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Correct. Yeah, it's true. It's from a site called Inquiries
Journal dot com. It's an article written by Bang Ming
Tzu for the Journal of Interstate Affairs and it was
reposted on this increased Journal site, and it basically says
the historians believe that the Communist Party, the Chinese Communist Party,
was really making preparations in Taiwan to unify China because
(17:18):
it had been fractured, its economy was in shambles because
of World War Two, and most scholars agree that the
reason they got involved in this North Korean conflict was
because they looked at the potential of an American invasion
of their country as being on the table. If they
successfully invaded North Korea and did this, you know, were
(17:40):
able to stem the tide of communism as it were.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah, the communist capitalist confrontation. To a lot of the
leadership of China at the time, this was seen as inevitable,
and China and the US were seen as natural enemies
by the leadership of China at that time and probably
by more than a few senior officials in the US.
So this battle was looking terrible for the US side.
(18:06):
First off, they are drastically outnumbered. Secondly, the area that
they're in, chang Jin, or Chosen as it's often called,
was just brutal. It was terrible. The temperature was around
negative thirty fahrenheit yikes. Yeah, And because they were outnumbered,
surrounded by one hundred and twenty thousand Chinese troops, as
(18:28):
we said, which seemed like a death sentence and the
US Forces.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Oh we should say who they were specifically. Yeah, they
were the first Marine Division of the US X Corps. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
So they put out this request for mortar shells to
be delivered via air drop because again, they can't get
them through land sources. They're surrounded. But the problem was
the problem was they didn't want to go on an
easily interceptible line of communication and request mortar shells because
then the enemy forced would know.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
So they had to use a code word, yeah, which
we've been harping on at the beginning of this episode,
and he might have been wondering why, and it was
tootsi rolls. It was tootsiras toutsi rolls was the code
word for these particular types of mortar shows. But unfortunately,
the person that intercepted that request, he didn't have his
like handy dandy code book translator with him or something.
(19:22):
And you think that'd be one that people would know though,
you know.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Right, mortar show requests would have been not uncommon, right,
I guess not.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
Maybe I'm confused as to why this guy was so confused.
But confused he was because he did, in fact call
in an air drop.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, He panicked because he was like, I don't know
what they're asking for exactly, but they said it was urgent,
like life or death. So he calls in this air drop,
But what exactly drops from the air there?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Noel, Yeah, And it's not clear exactly how many were talking,
but it was a must have been a quite large
shipment packed I'm picturing it like parachuted down, packed in
like wooden crates of actual facts, tutsi.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Roles, palettes, multiple palettes, yeah, exactly, and the troops, instead
of completely losing all hope, they said, well, we let's,
I don't know, let's see what we can do with these,
which just sounds such like such a terrible situation. You're
surrounded by more than one hundred thousand people who want
(20:24):
you dead. Yeah, you request some sort of ammunition, and
all of a sudden, you get palettes of Halloween.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Can you know? When I first started looking into the story,
and it reminded me a lot of the episode we
did about the US naval men who threw potatoes at
the Japanese submarine. Yeah, yeah, submariners by the way, Mariner,
thanks everybody, thanks, right, And yet there is a superhero
named the sub mariner. So yeah, you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
I think that's where we were both coming from.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
I think that's exactly where coming You never.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Understood why that guy has wings on his feet.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
He does? Yeah, is he kind of the precursor to Aquaman.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
I can't remember who came first, but I would say
the main differences are that nay more the submarine or
sub mariner can fly, So I guess that's why he
has the wings on his feet, and Aquaman can speak
with the creatures.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Of the deep. He's like the Doctor Doolittle of the sea.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Yeah, that's a really good way to put it.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
So I'm picturing them just like chucking these these tutsi
rolls at the enemy, the Marines, not the submarin. No, No,
that'd be strange. Both would be pretty strange. But no,
that's not what they did. They decided to get a
little bit more crafty with it. They had a hard
time because of the sub zero temperatures cooking their food
(21:40):
and eating their food up, and so they were actually
able to, like your story earlier about the pilot who
subsisted on tutsi rolls for a long time, they were
able to use their bodies to get these tutsi rolls
to warm up to a more pliable, you know, edible,
edible state, and then eat them. And they would also
(22:00):
you know, they could do that in their mouth or what.
I'm not quite sure why they used their bodies.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Do you put it in your armpits? You can still
do stuff, probably too, Yeah, well, war as hell, war
as hell.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Not only that, though, they were able to do some
other pretty clever stuff with them too.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
Yes, yeah, that's absolutely right. So not only would this
stuff become pliable when it was warm through body heat
or in someone's mouth, but it would quickly freeze when
it left that warm environment. And so they found these
marines found that they were able to get a tutsi
roll pliable and then use it as a type of
(22:35):
makeshift weld. They were able to patch bullet holes in vehicles,
They were able to patch hoses other equipment. Now this
is over a period of two weeks. This battle the
Chosen Reservoir and the fifteen thousand men the Division of
Marines did not leave unscathed and where Kia killed in action,
(23:02):
six thousand were wounded, and thousands had you know, terrible, terrible,
terrible frostbite and they were living on Tutsi rolls because
I believe all the other food was just frozen solid, correct,
that's right. So you have to wonder if it's a
function of the extreme temperature that allowed a Tutsi role
to be so useful there, because ordinarily, like if we
(23:25):
were if we were in a less frigid environment and
we tried to patch a hose with a Tutsi role
that we had chewed on, like, that wouldn't work, right, clearly.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Not, I would think.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Not.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Okay, So all that's pretty rough, But there's good news
because they did persevere and they were able to stave
off the enemy forces, and despite those casualties and those injuries,
they ultimately survived. A group of them known henceforth as
the Chosen Few. Get it, c Hosi n oh I
(23:59):
didn't even catch that pen you got, I didn't know.
I didn't know. I didn't. Uh. Yes, So they did.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
They did manage to survive, and not only to survive,
but to emerge victorious, and they returned to the US
lauded as heroes. And you know what, the Tutsi Rule
Company had to love this.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Yeah, you'd think, so, I'm sure do you think they
capitalized on it in their marketing materials.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
I didn't find anything indicating that that would be a
missed opportunity, though for sure maybe they felt it was
too exploitative. Well, it's sort of like the potato story
where the Idaho Potato Growers Association or whatever totally made
a plaque about it the main potatoes. Excuse me, the
main potatoes.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, so, well, maybe they thought it made their candy
look bad. There's also that.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
That's true that it was like the last possible thing
you would want to eat. And it's literally, you know,
you are dying in the frozen waists and you use
their product to plug bullet holes keep them in their armpits.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
And yeah, just to I just said, I think that's
it because it's kind of like with a you know
how a lot of soda due to the bicarbonate and
it can dissolve things. It's like if someone used Coca
cola to dissolve something in the midst of war. I'm
sure Coca cola wouldn't be like, hey, drink this thing
(25:22):
that can You know, people.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
Used to like clear the corrosion on their battery terminals,
right right, No, No, not a good look.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
So it is a good look for these guys when
they return. Although the Tutsi roll Company does not, for
one reason or another, capitalize on this story. In the US,
people were impressed these folks have used what side note
here was Frank Sinatra's favorite candy?
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, it wasn't he like buried with a bunch of them?
Do you think it was a palette? Yeah? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
I remember we were reading that in a great article
on Tutsi Rolls by Jeff Wells. Jeff mentions that Old
Blue Eyes himself was buried Tutsi Rolls cigarettes a lighter
at a bottle of Jack Daniels. But we digress to
get back on the rails. These guys returned to the US,
(26:14):
As we said, they are lauded as heroes, and they
were I don't know, nowadays largely forgotten. This is somewhat
of an obscure story, but people still remember it.
Speaker 3 (26:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Well, in twenty eleven in South Bend, Indiana, they actually
did a recreation of this event at the Southwest Michigan
Regional Airport, which is in Benton Harbor, So I guess
that's near South Bend. This was reported in the South
Bend Tribune, and a guy named Don alsbro is, the
president of a veterans group called Lest We Forget, was
(26:46):
in charge of this event and they organized an air
drop where thousands of Tutsi rolls were dropped on the
airport to commemorate that day during the Korean War. And
Alsborough himself was part of this team, the unit, and
he was actually handed a medal by President Eisenhower himself.
(27:08):
And he says in this article that Eisenhower told him
you must have a body of steel. So you know.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
Steel, it's like in terms of durability, it's just under
Tutsi roles, I believe.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Yeah, And this guy is the real deal in terms
of heroism. He had already been injured by a grenade
and then while one of their machine gun squad leaders
was getting treatment, medical treatment, another enemy grenade got lobbed
at them, and this guy smothered it with his own body.
Oh one of those, yeah, yeah, and he survived. And
(27:43):
that's where you must have a body of steel comment
came from.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
And so we conclude our tale, the strange story of
Tutsi roles in the Korean War. It seems as if
we're generating kind of a theme here a running series
on food in war, But I'm fine with that. You know,
I think this is an interesting topic. We hope you
think it's an interesting topic too. Let us know if
(28:08):
you'd like to hear an episode about the surprisingly somber
origin story of Tutsi roles. But the show's not over yet.
We were talking earlier off air, and you know what,
we're over due for NOL a little listener mail.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Our first letter comes from Kelsey and it has to
do with farts, which is one of our favorite topics
of all time. So it says, Hey, Ben and Noel
and Casey. As a longtime listener of the show, I
felt I had to reach out to you after the
episode on rolland and professional Farting. I do historical re
enacting and have a tendency to listen to podcasts while
working in sewing dresses. While you were having Casey translate
(28:49):
Roland's names from French, it reminded me of one of
the biggest mysteries and historical costuming. Help me with this,
Casey the peton Laire, The peton Laire, Casey on the
Case third installment mid Listener Man segment within a segment. So,
the petentlaire is a traditional French court dress worn in
the eighteenth century. It is essentially a large gown with
(29:10):
a fitted bodice that is jack at length and is
the shortened version of the robe a la frances casey lajo.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
You've got closer casey on the case.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
That's never gonna happen for me. However, no one seems
to know where the name comes from, as petent lais
roughly translates to fart in the air. I can only
imagine the name came from a very embarrassing moment in
court and the name stuck. Anyways, I'm a huge fan
of the show and thought you might enjoy some more
flatulence related history. Kind regards, Kelsey.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Thanks so much for writing in, Kelsey. We love a
good historical mystery and this is something that maybe we
can also refer to our colleagues on our peer podcast Dressed.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
Yeah, and I think we're overdue to have them as guests.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yeah, we could definitely bring them on for a segment.
Maybe we could do one on fact any stuff. So also,
I really appreciate any good fart joke. I was close
years back when I was doing brain stuff things for
audio and video. I was terribly close to becoming the
(30:16):
fart Guy, and I was very hesitant to talk about
farts at first.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
Leaving the fart.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Guy, I was doing a lot of fart science fart material.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, I was going blue. You need to be like
mister Methane, remember him.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Yeah, I think mister Methane's got his own lane. I
think we should let him be him. I don't want
to take that away unless there's but you know what,
if there's a Sergeant Sulfur out there somewhere, you can
write to us. We'll give you some aritime we'll record
you separately. We have another letter from someone who's been
(30:51):
writing to us pretty frequently, and that is a Umi,
who lives in Japan, I believe, and is an English teacher.
Umi says, hello, gentlemen, after an episode where you both
pronounced port manteau or port man two in the way
that you were called out on before, I made a
Twitter poll out of curiosity, because as I am an
(31:12):
English teacher, I'm incredibly aware that a lot of words
have multiple acceptable pronunciations. Also, your podcast was not the
only one in which I heard this pronunciation. Here are
my results. So Umi has posted this on Twitter, and
there's one Portman two spelled two and then Portmanteau spelled
(31:33):
t ow And did you just see.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
This null de oh? I did, yeah, And first I
was at my heart set on us being vindicated.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
So the two, the Portman two got fourteen percent of
the votes and Portmanteau got eighty six percent. Now, she continues,
she had seventy two people vote. She says, seventy two
votes is not a huge sample size, but if I
remember correctly from high school statistics class, it's enough of
one to say that you are not inherently wrong. Pronounce
(32:04):
an import man too, So you can go either way.
Have an excellent day regards Ayumi. And this got me thinking,
you guys, we should do more polls. But you know,
we can go onto our Facebook group it's true, and
do do polls to our heart's content.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
I think we should. And the name of that Facebook
group is the Ridiculous Historians, where you can join, become
a member, and get in on all the polling fun
the future polling. There isn't any there yet, not that
we know it. Soon. You can also send us email
where we are ridiculous at HowStuffWorks dot Com and you
can you know, do the regular Facebook page if you want,
which is just ridiculous history on Facebook. I think we're
(32:42):
on Twitter's ridiculous history as well. And Instagram and all
the stuff.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
All the hits, all the good ones, all the good ones,
and some of the weird ones. We'd also, of course
like to thank our super producer, Casey Pegram and our
research associates Christopher Hasiotis and needs, Jeff Goat.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Oh and let's lest we forget Alex Williams, who can
post our theme. No.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Uh, I'm not completely sure how to say goodbye and Korean,
but I think you I think the same casual hello
is the same casual goodbye.
Speaker 2 (33:11):
So on Youngs. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Fellow ridiculous historians, we return to you, uh treats in hand,
(00:05):
just like our good friends at Sweetwater with a classic
episode I.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Love war and Candy. Yeah, oh wait, no, I smell it,
I smell water, I smell sex, can smell sex. Yeah,
that's right, that was the ref got was that Marcy's
playground or just marcie playground? I don't think it's possessive. Yeah, yeah,
you might be right. You might be right.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
It's a it's a banger, though, but we are kind
of talking about candy, and I think in this classic episode,
the infamous Toutsy roll air Drop, we also air some
of our opinions about scrumptious treats.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Is this the one where y'all gang up on me
over Almond Joy? No, that's the one we did recently. Okay, well,
I stand by it. All Enjoy is you're still on
the almonds. I'm on the Almond Joy Baby, Mounds can
take it or leave Almonds Joy, give me all you got.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Shung Wing this stand up cop that I absolutely love.
He has a Netflix special wherein he has an extended
rant about Almond Joy and Mounds, and I think that's
a person who will speak to you on a spiritual level.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Yeah, well, Allmond Joy's got nuts, mounds don't. But during
the Battle of Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War, the
First Marine Division seemed absolutely doomed. There were no nuts
about it.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
Yes, yeah, And a lot of times in the modern day,
especially people in the West, we forget just how close
the Korean War came to a total victory for North
Korean forces before the before the temporary peace was achieved,
(01:45):
the peace that exists today. The war has not officially ended.
So we're going to travel back there with you folks. Surrounded, outnumbered,
out gunned, running low on every imaginable supply, the US
Marines call for it air drop of AMMO, a life
saving reup, and instead of getting AMMO for guns, they
(02:09):
get what we could call AMMO for Halloween. They get
Totsy rolls.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Man, AMMO for the gaps between your teeth and your molars. Yeah, Tootsio,
you probably load those things up into some sort of blunderbus,
you know, shoot them at people. Those things were seriously dense,
But it turns out they were good for quite a
bit more than maybe was anticipated. And this serendipitous there
we say, fortuitous air drop mix up kind of had
(02:39):
a silver lining.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
To it, exactly yes, and oh gosh, I look back
on this one fondly. I can't believe this was all
the way back in twenty eighteen, but it holds up.
No spoilers, folks, Let's roll the tape. Oh, can we
totsy roll the tape? Let's totsy roll the tape. Yeah,
ridiculous histories of reduction of iHeartRadio. A young hasio fellow,
(03:27):
ridiculous historians. Welcome to the show. That is my poorly
pronounced attempt at saying hello in Korean, or one version of.
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Hello, Hello to you, Ben. My name is.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Nolan, Hello to you Nol, My name is Ben.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Yeah. Look at that. It checks out, And of course we're.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Joining as always with our super producer, Casey Pegram.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
You know, Ben, there's one thing we did not learn
how to say in Korean. Well, there's a lot of
things we didn't learn how to say in Korean, but
one of them it's tutsi role. And I wouldn't be
surprised if maybe there was one of those phonetic pronunciations.
Your girl friend showed me the other night we were
hanging out a thing that she took back from your
trip to Korea that had a phonetic pronunciation of the
word lighter. And it was just three characters, and it
(04:10):
was Laja tour, I believe, which is nonsense in Korean,
nonsense in Korean. So I'm wondering if maybe there's a
similar thing for tutsiro.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So why are we saying hello in Korean today?
Speaker 2 (04:23):
I don't know. I didn't do my homework. Can you
help me out?
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You know?
Speaker 2 (04:28):
Surely? Well we were talking about, you know, the topic
is related to Korea and a particular conflict that took
place in Korea that I was woefully under educated about.
And I know Ben that you probably were more educated
about this particular situation than me. So why don't you
give us maybe your background and why this might be
the case.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Right, Noel, you and I before we went into this episode,
I think we both knew a little bit about the
conflict called the Korean War here in the States.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Yeah, just mainly from watching reruns of Mash.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Is Mash Korean War. I really I am not a
mash Burt.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
People always think it's about Vietnam because it was on
during Vietnam, but it is in fact about the Korean War,
even though it was kind of quote unquote also about Vietnam.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Casey on the case. So thanks for teaching me about Mash, Guys,
I hear. It's a great show. I've just never seen it.
Did you ever watch it?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Yeah? I didn't watch it a time, but I watched
it enough to learn a little bit about the Korean
War and also to know that the theme song of
Mash actually has lyrics in the movie, and it's a
very sad song.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Yes, suicide is painless. It's a wonderful song. It's beautiful,
but it's sad. Yeah, beautiful is probably a better word there.
So the Korean War, which is also called the Liberation
War in some places, was waged between nineteen fifty to
nineteen fifty three June nineteen fifty to July nineteen fifty three,
(05:54):
a war between what we now call the DPRK or
North Korea and the ROK or South Korea. And it
was a proxy war because there was support on the
North Korean side from Russia and there was support on
the South Korean side from the US.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
It's because it was basically the Imperial spoils of the
Second World War where Japan lost their territory, which was Korea,
and so the US and Russia kind of had to
split it up between themselves. So the US reluctantly were
sort of in charge of South Korea and Russia Communist
(06:30):
Russia was in charge of North Korea, and so it
created this divide between communism and democracy.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Right, Yes, this is a very much a Cold War
esque conflict.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
I think it's considered the first step that led to
the Cold War, right.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yeah, yeah, in some ways it is because this was
still this is what we would call a hot war,
because there were actually weapons of war being waged. But
it very much was a symptom of this ideological conflt
that would later determine so much of geopolitics for decades.
And we could get I don't know if we should
get too far in the weeds on that one, because
(07:07):
this is kind of the backdrop for our story, but
I guess we should point out this war, in a
very real way, never actually ended. And if you go
to Korea today, you will if you visit the capital city, Soul,
you are very close to the de Militarized Zone or DMZ.
Didn't you do that thing, Ben, Yes, yeah, I did.
(07:28):
I went recently to the Republic of Korea and then
visited the DMZ, which.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Is a weird place.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It was a weird place, but it's a physical, tangible
reminder that this war, although it may sound like it
was ancient in the nineteen fifties and stuff, it still
affects the people on the peninsula and in the larger region.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
I guess we didn't really fully get into what the
conflict was. We talked about how the US and Russia
inherited the Koreek Korea from Japan, but the Russian backed
I guess you could say North Korea actually invaded South Korea.
And that's what kicked off this big ideological battle because
the US as opposed to, you know, practicing appeasement or
(08:16):
something like that, because this wasn't really they didn't really
even want South Korea. It was just something they were
kind of like saddled with because of, you know, the
outcome of World War two, and they looked at this
as not just an invasion into something that they responsible for.
They looked at it as the potential match that would
light the world on fire with communists.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Right.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Yeah, So this Cold War conflict results in Korea being
split into two separate states on the peninsula. But the
problem is both of those governments consider themselves the sole
legitimate government of the entire place, so they look at
the other government not as an equal separate state. They
(08:57):
look at it as this regime that should be toppled
as soon as possible.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
And that was with under Kim Il Sung right.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Right, Kim Il Sung, the first Supreme Leader of North
Korea from its establishment in nineteen forty eight. The conflict
when it occurs becomes a war of attrition. At first,
North Korea is whipping the South Korean forces like all
(09:26):
the way down to Busson and Soul. Over the course
of the conflict changes hands multiple times. Eventually, when the
fighting actually ends and they sign an armiscice, they make
this DMZ line along the thirtieth parallel, but they never
signed a peace treaty. So even today as we record this,
(09:49):
technically the two nations are still at war, even after
the fall of the USSR.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
And ben What was it like to visit to be
in that DMZ zone. Didn't you have to watch some
kind of propaganda video. Yeah, that also explos how it
was an amazing bird sanctuary.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, it's the only part of the tour I was
not like I didn't have the option of skipping. So
you see a couple of different places. You see an
observatory tower, you see the train station that could ship
people or transport people directly to the capital of North Korea.
And you go down a very steep tunnel, an invasion tunnel.
(10:26):
There are three or four that are discovered, but there
are multiple other ones suspected to exist.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
And you see how the.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Tunnel was constructed through the DMZ and it's not a
comfortable walk, but estimates say they could carry thirty thousand
plus people through there to invade Seoul. But the one
part of the tour you cannot skip is at least
our tour guide tell us you couldn't is after you
get out of the tunnel, Chicken is a very very
steep walk. You have to watch about an eight to
(10:57):
ten minute propaganda film from the South Korean side, the
rok side, about how great the DMZ is for migratory
birds and biodiversity, which is actually that's true, and you
know it's got the whole nine of every propaganda movie
you can imagine. You can see that, like the hands
from opposite sides of the screen clasping each other, like
(11:19):
that meme that's so popular nowadays. And it's strange because
I was expecting propaganda from the North Korean side. I
was surprised how much exists on the South Korean side.
There's still very much a conflict. And today's episode takes
us back to when that was a hot war, not
just an armistice. So Noel, our story today concerns those
(11:42):
two things we mentioned. We talked a little bit about Korea,
but we teased at the top of the show Tutsi rolls,
and this is something where I wanted to check on
our mutual americanisms. I feel like for all three of us, Casey,
you and myself, tutsi roles seem like a very well
known thing.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Right.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Are they a US famous candy or a world famous candy?
Speaker 2 (12:06):
You know that's a good question, Ben, I don't know. Well,
just to be.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Safe, we can give the quick and dirty. Tutsi rolls
were invented by a guy named Leo Hirshfield, who sold
them out of a Brooklyn candy shop before he sold
the idea to a group called Stern and Solberg.
Speaker 2 (12:26):
And that could actually be an episode unto itself, because
there's a really intense, kind of tragic ending to that story.
And there is a lot of hot debate as to
whether he invented the candy and then sold it to them,
or if it was the other way around. He also
invented or he had several patents for different candy making equipment,
but he also this is probably my favorite name of
(12:47):
any product ever. Yeah, he invented a type of gelatine
that was pre jello called Bromangelon.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
Bromangelon, which I think would be great on a T
shirt and a great nickname for one of those not
just nicknames like Brusve.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Yeah, exactly, Bromangelin I'm gonna use that. But anyway, a
point being, if you don't know what it's zero is,
where have you been. They're not that good. They get
stuck in your teeth. I'm not a huge fan, but
they are very tightly wrapped in these little you know,
with the ends and the little bow ends on the side.
You can also get them in like a stick form.
You know. They're much larger, and they're kind of the
(13:24):
candy that you got at Halloween that you would rather
have gotten something else.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
For me, they were acceptable, They were passable Halloween candies.
Anything was better than that orange and black wax paper taffy.
Do you guys remember that Casey is nodding. He is
so tired of that.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Yeah, it's gross.
Speaker 3 (13:42):
It's like the last stuff you eat, and you do
eat it, but it's the last thing you eat and
you feel gross afterwards.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And that's been Casey on the case part too. We're
doing them in installments now, which is important because when
you take them all together, it creates a whole picture.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
And we're going to syndicate these onto other shows. We're
just not going to tell the other shows. Casey will
pop in and hopefully it'll make sense. But Tutsi rolls,
which you know which I think you're right, are a
story all their own. Tutsi rules were also valuable, not
(14:18):
just as Halloween candy, but as World War Two rations
because just like you said, you know how, they're individually wrapped,
they have a very high temperature tolerance. It's pretty much
like chocolate wax almost, and they were seen by Uncle
Sam as a source of quick energy because they also
would remain edible for a long period of time.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
When you say energy, we're just basically talking like sugar, right, Yeah,
just full of sugars. There's no other nutritional value in
tutsi rolls.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
No, No, they're not part of a balanced diet. But yeah,
it was a burst of energy kind of thing. And
there are stories you would find about how tutsi rolls
helped soldiers, like how there was actually some fire behind
the smoke. One story is of a pilot whose plane
was shot down over the Sahara Desert and survived for
(15:08):
three days just on tutsi rolls. But today's story is
much less anecdotal, much more provable, and it's about a
group of Marines who were in a particular battle in
the Korean War.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Yeah, that battle was called the Battle of Chosin Reservoir Chosin,
which is also called chang Jen. This was one of
the first campaigns of the Korean War. It was called
the Chinese People's Volunteer Army, and they got involved because
they felt like American troops coming in to North Korea
(15:48):
was in some way encroaching on their territory. And I
was a little foggy as to why that was, because
it didn't seem like they necessarily had an axe to
grind in this particular war, and yet they made their
troops available to help the North Koreans. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
So Chinese sources refer to this battle as the eastern
part of the Second Phase Offensive. They entered the conflict
to infiltrate, as you said, part of North Korea. We
know that they were under the command of Song Shi Lun,
who had been ordered by Mao Zedong to destroy the
(16:28):
United Nations forces. We have to keep in mind that
at the time this was the United Nations was a
part of this conflict. There were I think thirty thousand
United Nations troops here and about one hundred and twenty
thousand Chinese troops who were essentially attempting to eradicate the
(16:50):
United Nations. But no, there's an article you found that
goes into a little bit more detail about this.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Correct. Yeah, it's true. It's from a site called Inquiries
Journal dot com. It's an article written by Bang Ming
Tzu for the Journal of Interstate Affairs and it was
reposted on this increased Journal site, and it basically says
the historians believe that the Communist Party, the Chinese Communist Party,
was really making preparations in Taiwan to unify China because
(17:18):
it had been fractured, its economy was in shambles because
of World War Two, and most scholars agree that the
reason they got involved in this North Korean conflict was
because they looked at the potential of an American invasion
of their country as being on the table. If they
successfully invaded North Korea and did this, you know, were
(17:40):
able to stem the tide of communism as it were.
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah, the communist capitalist confrontation. To a lot of the
leadership of China at the time, this was seen as inevitable,
and China and the US were seen as natural enemies
by the leadership of China at that time and probably
by more than a few senior officials in the US.
So this battle was looking terrible for the US side.
(18:06):
First off, they are drastically outnumbered. Secondly, the area that
they're in, chang Jin, or Chosen as it's often called,
was just brutal. It was terrible. The temperature was around
negative thirty fahrenheit yikes. Yeah, And because they were outnumbered,
surrounded by one hundred and twenty thousand Chinese troops, as
(18:28):
we said, which seemed like a death sentence and the
US Forces.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Oh we should say who they were specifically. Yeah, they
were the first Marine Division of the US X Corps. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
So they put out this request for mortar shells to
be delivered via air drop because again, they can't get
them through land sources. They're surrounded. But the problem was
the problem was they didn't want to go on an
easily interceptible line of communication and request mortar shells because
then the enemy forced would know.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
So they had to use a code word, yeah, which
we've been harping on at the beginning of this episode,
and he might have been wondering why, and it was
tootsi rolls. It was tootsiras toutsi rolls was the code
word for these particular types of mortar shows. But unfortunately,
the person that intercepted that request, he didn't have his
like handy dandy code book translator with him or something.
(19:22):
And you think that'd be one that people would know though,
you know.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Right, mortar show requests would have been not uncommon, right,
I guess not.
Speaker 2 (19:31):
Maybe I'm confused as to why this guy was so confused.
But confused he was because he did, in fact call
in an air drop.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, He panicked because he was like, I don't know
what they're asking for exactly, but they said it was urgent,
like life or death. So he calls in this air drop,
But what exactly drops from the air there?
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Noel, Yeah, And it's not clear exactly how many were talking,
but it was a must have been a quite large
shipment packed I'm picturing it like parachuted down, packed in
like wooden crates of actual facts, tutsi.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Roles, palettes, multiple palettes, yeah, exactly, and the troops, instead
of completely losing all hope, they said, well, we let's,
I don't know, let's see what we can do with these,
which just sounds such like such a terrible situation. You're
surrounded by more than one hundred thousand people who want
(20:24):
you dead. Yeah, you request some sort of ammunition, and
all of a sudden, you get palettes of Halloween.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
Can you know? When I first started looking into the story,
and it reminded me a lot of the episode we
did about the US naval men who threw potatoes at
the Japanese submarine. Yeah, yeah, submariners by the way, Mariner,
thanks everybody, thanks, right, And yet there is a superhero
named the sub mariner. So yeah, you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
I think that's where we were both coming from.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
I think that's exactly where coming You never.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Understood why that guy has wings on his feet.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
He does? Yeah, is he kind of the precursor to Aquaman.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
I can't remember who came first, but I would say
the main differences are that nay more the submarine or
sub mariner can fly, So I guess that's why he
has the wings on his feet, and Aquaman can speak
with the creatures.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Of the deep. He's like the Doctor Doolittle of the sea.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Yeah, that's a really good way to put it.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
So I'm picturing them just like chucking these these tutsi
rolls at the enemy, the Marines, not the submarin. No, No,
that'd be strange. Both would be pretty strange. But no,
that's not what they did. They decided to get a
little bit more crafty with it. They had a hard
time because of the sub zero temperatures cooking their food
(21:40):
and eating their food up, and so they were actually
able to, like your story earlier about the pilot who
subsisted on tutsi rolls for a long time, they were
able to use their bodies to get these tutsi rolls
to warm up to a more pliable, you know, edible,
edible state, and then eat them. And they would also
(22:00):
you know, they could do that in their mouth or what.
I'm not quite sure why they used their bodies.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Do you put it in your armpits? You can still
do stuff, probably too, Yeah, well, war as hell, war
as hell.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Not only that, though, they were able to do some
other pretty clever stuff with them too.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
Yes, yeah, that's absolutely right. So not only would this
stuff become pliable when it was warm through body heat
or in someone's mouth, but it would quickly freeze when
it left that warm environment. And so they found these
marines found that they were able to get a tutsi
roll pliable and then use it as a type of
(22:35):
makeshift weld. They were able to patch bullet holes in vehicles,
They were able to patch hoses other equipment. Now this
is over a period of two weeks. This battle the
Chosen Reservoir and the fifteen thousand men the Division of
Marines did not leave unscathed and where Kia killed in action,
(23:02):
six thousand were wounded, and thousands had you know, terrible, terrible,
terrible frostbite and they were living on Tutsi rolls because
I believe all the other food was just frozen solid, correct,
that's right. So you have to wonder if it's a
function of the extreme temperature that allowed a Tutsi role
to be so useful there, because ordinarily, like if we
(23:25):
were if we were in a less frigid environment and
we tried to patch a hose with a Tutsi role
that we had chewed on, like, that wouldn't work, right, clearly.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
Not, I would think.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Not.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Okay, So all that's pretty rough, But there's good news
because they did persevere and they were able to stave
off the enemy forces, and despite those casualties and those injuries,
they ultimately survived. A group of them known henceforth as
the Chosen Few. Get it, c Hosi n oh I
(23:59):
didn't even catch that pen you got, I didn't know.
I didn't know. I didn't. Uh. Yes, So they did.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
They did manage to survive, and not only to survive,
but to emerge victorious, and they returned to the US
lauded as heroes. And you know what, the Tutsi Rule
Company had to love this.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Yeah, you'd think, so, I'm sure do you think they
capitalized on it in their marketing materials.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
I didn't find anything indicating that that would be a
missed opportunity, though for sure maybe they felt it was
too exploitative. Well, it's sort of like the potato story
where the Idaho Potato Growers Association or whatever totally made
a plaque about it the main potatoes. Excuse me, the
main potatoes.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, so, well, maybe they thought it made their candy
look bad. There's also that.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
That's true that it was like the last possible thing
you would want to eat. And it's literally, you know,
you are dying in the frozen waists and you use
their product to plug bullet holes keep them in their armpits.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
And yeah, just to I just said, I think that's
it because it's kind of like with a you know
how a lot of soda due to the bicarbonate and
it can dissolve things. It's like if someone used Coca
cola to dissolve something in the midst of war. I'm
sure Coca cola wouldn't be like, hey, drink this thing
(25:22):
that can You know, people.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
Used to like clear the corrosion on their battery terminals,
right right, No, No, not a good look.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
So it is a good look for these guys when
they return. Although the Tutsi roll Company does not, for
one reason or another, capitalize on this story. In the US,
people were impressed these folks have used what side note
here was Frank Sinatra's favorite candy?
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, it wasn't he like buried with a bunch of them?
Do you think it was a palette? Yeah? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
I remember we were reading that in a great article
on Tutsi Rolls by Jeff Wells. Jeff mentions that Old
Blue Eyes himself was buried Tutsi Rolls cigarettes a lighter
at a bottle of Jack Daniels. But we digress to
get back on the rails. These guys returned to the US,
(26:14):
As we said, they are lauded as heroes, and they
were I don't know, nowadays largely forgotten. This is somewhat
of an obscure story, but people still remember it.
Speaker 3 (26:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:25):
Well, in twenty eleven in South Bend, Indiana, they actually
did a recreation of this event at the Southwest Michigan
Regional Airport, which is in Benton Harbor, So I guess
that's near South Bend. This was reported in the South
Bend Tribune, and a guy named Don alsbro is, the
president of a veterans group called Lest We Forget, was
(26:46):
in charge of this event and they organized an air
drop where thousands of Tutsi rolls were dropped on the
airport to commemorate that day during the Korean War. And
Alsborough himself was part of this team, the unit, and
he was actually handed a medal by President Eisenhower himself.
(27:08):
And he says in this article that Eisenhower told him
you must have a body of steel. So you know.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
Steel, it's like in terms of durability, it's just under
Tutsi roles, I believe.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Yeah, And this guy is the real deal in terms
of heroism. He had already been injured by a grenade
and then while one of their machine gun squad leaders
was getting treatment, medical treatment, another enemy grenade got lobbed
at them, and this guy smothered it with his own body.
Oh one of those, yeah, yeah, and he survived. And
(27:43):
that's where you must have a body of steel comment
came from.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
And so we conclude our tale, the strange story of
Tutsi roles in the Korean War. It seems as if
we're generating kind of a theme here a running series
on food in war, But I'm fine with that. You know,
I think this is an interesting topic. We hope you
think it's an interesting topic too. Let us know if
(28:08):
you'd like to hear an episode about the surprisingly somber
origin story of Tutsi roles. But the show's not over yet.
We were talking earlier off air, and you know what,
we're over due for NOL a little listener mail.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Our first letter comes from Kelsey and it has to
do with farts, which is one of our favorite topics
of all time. So it says, Hey, Ben and Noel
and Casey. As a longtime listener of the show, I
felt I had to reach out to you after the
episode on rolland and professional Farting. I do historical re
enacting and have a tendency to listen to podcasts while
working in sewing dresses. While you were having Casey translate
(28:49):
Roland's names from French, it reminded me of one of
the biggest mysteries and historical costuming. Help me with this,
Casey the peton Laire, The peton Laire, Casey on the
Case third installment mid Listener Man segment within a segment. So,
the petentlaire is a traditional French court dress worn in
the eighteenth century. It is essentially a large gown with
(29:10):
a fitted bodice that is jack at length and is
the shortened version of the robe a la frances casey lajo.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
You've got closer casey on the case.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
That's never gonna happen for me. However, no one seems
to know where the name comes from, as petent lais
roughly translates to fart in the air. I can only
imagine the name came from a very embarrassing moment in
court and the name stuck. Anyways, I'm a huge fan
of the show and thought you might enjoy some more
flatulence related history. Kind regards, Kelsey.
Speaker 1 (29:42):
Thanks so much for writing in, Kelsey. We love a
good historical mystery and this is something that maybe we
can also refer to our colleagues on our peer podcast Dressed.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
Yeah, and I think we're overdue to have them as guests.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yeah, we could definitely bring them on for a segment.
Maybe we could do one on fact any stuff. So also,
I really appreciate any good fart joke. I was close
years back when I was doing brain stuff things for
audio and video. I was terribly close to becoming the
(30:16):
fart Guy, and I was very hesitant to talk about
farts at first.
Speaker 2 (30:21):
Leaving the fart.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
Guy, I was doing a lot of fart science fart material.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, I was going blue. You need to be like
mister Methane, remember him.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Yeah, I think mister Methane's got his own lane. I
think we should let him be him. I don't want
to take that away unless there's but you know what,
if there's a Sergeant Sulfur out there somewhere, you can
write to us. We'll give you some aritime we'll record
you separately. We have another letter from someone who's been
(30:51):
writing to us pretty frequently, and that is a Umi,
who lives in Japan, I believe, and is an English teacher.
Umi says, hello, gentlemen, after an episode where you both
pronounced port manteau or port man two in the way
that you were called out on before, I made a
Twitter poll out of curiosity, because as I am an
(31:12):
English teacher, I'm incredibly aware that a lot of words
have multiple acceptable pronunciations. Also, your podcast was not the
only one in which I heard this pronunciation. Here are
my results. So Umi has posted this on Twitter, and
there's one Portman two spelled two and then Portmanteau spelled
(31:33):
t ow And did you just see.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
This null de oh? I did, yeah, And first I
was at my heart set on us being vindicated.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
So the two, the Portman two got fourteen percent of
the votes and Portmanteau got eighty six percent. Now, she continues,
she had seventy two people vote. She says, seventy two
votes is not a huge sample size, but if I
remember correctly from high school statistics class, it's enough of
one to say that you are not inherently wrong. Pronounce
(32:04):
an import man too, So you can go either way.
Have an excellent day regards Ayumi. And this got me thinking,
you guys, we should do more polls. But you know,
we can go onto our Facebook group it's true, and
do do polls to our heart's content.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
I think we should. And the name of that Facebook
group is the Ridiculous Historians, where you can join, become
a member, and get in on all the polling fun
the future polling. There isn't any there yet, not that
we know it. Soon. You can also send us email
where we are ridiculous at HowStuffWorks dot Com and you
can you know, do the regular Facebook page if you want,
which is just ridiculous history on Facebook. I think we're
(32:42):
on Twitter's ridiculous history as well. And Instagram and all
the stuff.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
All the hits, all the good ones, all the good ones,
and some of the weird ones. We'd also, of course
like to thank our super producer, Casey Pegram and our
research associates Christopher Hasiotis and needs, Jeff Goat.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Oh and let's lest we forget Alex Williams, who can
post our theme. No.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Uh, I'm not completely sure how to say goodbye and Korean,
but I think you I think the same casual hello
is the same casual goodbye.
Speaker 2 (33:11):
So on Youngs. 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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