March 4, 2025 • 41 mins
Billy Magnussen (Game Night, The Franchise) takes some time for a liesurely trip with Arturo to the early 1900's, where they discover the story of Gunther Pluschow, one of the most infamous escapees from World War I.
Read this episode's transcript on Mental Floss: https://www.mentalfloss.com/columns/greatest-escapes
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is as great as Escapes, a show bringing you
the wildest true escape stories of all time. I'm Attura
Castro and I'm here with the incredibly talented actor with
the voice of an absolute angel, Billy Magnuson. Guys, what
(00:41):
a treat we have for you today. We have the one,
the only Billy Magnusse. So, brother, thank you so much
for doing this. I really appreciate it. You and Georgia
right now building a house from from from the ground up, by.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yourself, renovating, renovating.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
No, no, no, you're building a house by yourself because
you're impressively fun.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
This admitted with my brothers. Actually it's actually with my
brothers and my dad. You know, grew up in a
carpentry shop.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
So are you renovating a house you grew up in
or a house you got in Georgia?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
No, house I got in Georgia. It's like close to
my parents' place.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
So you know, when I'm not shooting a movie with
you co starring next to you, you know, I'm building houses.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Work in construction, that's all. You're doing a movie or
you're building a house. That's what building Magison does.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
All right, that's it. What else is there to do?
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Do you have something that you considered to be your
greatest escape?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Brother, My biggest real escape was like probably getting away
from a life I didn't want to live. I would say, like,
I'm emotionally and deep. We came from the generation a
little bit before social media and shit like that, and
that that comparison thing that it causes, or at least
it caused me to do fucking crushed me me and
(02:00):
like detox from that and not do that shit. It's
been so helpful.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Try try having the only other well known Watermellon actor
be Oscar Isaac. I mean every time every time I
did something even semi cool, my friends would send me
like the cover of a GQ with like an Oscar eyesagon,
and I was like, yep, got it, got it, got it.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
There was something about my own trust and like caring
for myself, I stop doing and to like move on,
move past that and escape that that black hole of it.
That's been the best escape in my life to enjoy life.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Again. Thank you for being so open with us, man.
Did you ever get faced with the like like unsmoking,
what do you have to complain about? Not from your
family but from other people sometimes Yeah, no.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
No, definitely from my family.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
But again I come from the majority of dudes that
you know, it's my mom and then like four guys
and that sounds weird.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
It's me and my brothers, you know, a bunch of
dudes that I just.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
Got some guys that I just build some house.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Yeah, but you know, David was just get your head
out of your ass and put yourself up, like what
do you got. Look, it's fucking beautiful today when you
get outside. It was tough love, okay. Escape was just yeah,
saying goodbye to that that life that wasn't working anymore,
or that mindset.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Well, brother, listen, thank you so much for opening up
about that. Are you ready for me to tell you
an insane escape? Brother?
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, that's rock and roll. So our story begins with
a man named Gunta Pluschkau. He was this German naval
officer in the early nineteen hundreds, and honestly, his life
was like a whole series of buck wild escapes. Eventually
he would even become one of the most famous prisoners
of World War One. We're going to start in the
(03:45):
year before the war started, when Gunta was assigned to
a brand new wing of the German military, the Air Force.
So of course this was when they were first starting
to experiment with flying. And it turns out the Gunta
was an absolute prodigy. So at the beginning of nineteen fourteen,
Gunter's story really took off. Because it's hard to say
(04:07):
this to believe, Gunter says it only took him three
days to learn how to fly. He was like, yeah,
I don't know. I just spent up in the air
and I stayed there like boom came down. It's very simple.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
I actually feel like flying is probably very like second
act or like riding a bike. Weirdly, I remember doing
a hanglighting thing and I was like, this makes so much.
It's like the mechanics of it really actually works in
my head.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
And you're in this nothing.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Kind of contraption, you know, it's just right the wind,
and it was just like this seems so simple.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Like you were simple what you're just feeling what the
air wanted to do, and you're just kind of like, oh,
this is how I can manipulate it, right.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, you just it's like surfing or something, you know,
like where you have to or snowboarding or skiing. You
could just feel where the momentum wants to take you.
It's like little dancing in the air. It makes sense
to me, so listen.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
So the German place of that time, they were called doves,
and they were fucking janky as hell, right, and they
required the pilot to do a lot of pulling on
wires and levers to make the wingspend. But Gunter says
that not only could he do it after just three days,
but he actually passed his flying exam on day five.
Do you have any prodigy level skills, Billy? Were you
immediately proficient at that uh what they called the goat
(05:19):
carcass throwing race?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well, coke peru co Yeah, no, definitely, not definitely. Not
that that was like showing up.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
That was like we were the Jamaican Bob sled team
showing up to like, you know, play coke peru. Coke
preau is a game basically during the World Nomad Games.
It's like one of the biggest sports in the stands.
And that was part of the first ever American coke
carew team, which is basically hockey like the same rules
as hockey, but you're on horseback and the balls of
dead goat carcass and you have to lean off the
(05:49):
horse to the ground, pick up the dead goat carcass
and throw it in the other team's goal.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
And it was the most aggressive thing I've ever done
in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Oh my god, is it is it shaped as a
ball or is it just literally like right.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Before, right before the game, cut off the head and
cut off at the elbows and knees. Oh my gosh,
and blood everything, Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
But then the winner gets to eat it.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Wow, that's fucking insane.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
That is insane.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
The German Air Force was so impressed with Gunta's prodigious
skills that they wanted to immediately ship him off to
the far reaches of the Empire. But Gunta must have
felt that he wasn't actually ready, so he made a
request before they sent him away. He asked for one
more long training flight across Germany, but this time joined
by a military observer. Yeah, if you're belief you're the
(06:41):
observer guy, you're gonna take this fucking flight with a
hotch a young pilot. I'd be like, fuck, no, man,
I'm busy avoiding syphilis and I don't want to die.
I was like, you know, it's like nineteen hundred.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Man, I just wanted my schnitzel and some beer.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Yeah, I got polio. Dude, I can't do that.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
I guess I would do it though I'm that kind
of guy.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Though you would, you would definitely do it.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
I like things in my life always show up, Like
if it shows up in front of me, I'm like,
this is the moment I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
That now, you know. It's yeah, yeah, It's like.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Eating bugs for the first time in like Highland.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
It just like shows up to you and you're like, eh, yes,
I'm doing this here.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
I'm a bugget to know, you know. I find that
with like weird phobias that i have, like afraid of
heights or whatever the fuck. But even though I'm afraid
of heights, I've cliff dived and I've skydived, and I've
you know, because I'm more afraid of missing out on
the experience than i am up my petty little fears,
if that makes any sense exactly, Dude.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I could not agree with you more. Would you ever
actually get your skydiving license?
Speaker 1 (07:35):
My girlfriend at the time didn't fucking know that I
was afraid of heights, and she got me a skydiving
thing for my birthday. But my birthday is in November,
and in New York you can't jump until June. So
I had about seven eight months to think about this
fucking thing, and I was like, I'm not gonna do it.
I'm not gonna do it. I'm not going to do it.
Two weeks before, there was an accident for a tandem
skydiving thing where the parents who didn't fully deploy and
(07:57):
so the dude landing on his client, and Vaporice is
client and he kind of survived, all fucked up, and
I was like, that's it. That's it. I'm not doing it.
And then my writing partner, who is at the time
who is the softest dude I've ever met, he was like, oh,
scot of yeah, I've been like four times. I was like,
there's no fucking world in which this market has gone
and I have not gone. Anyway, we go up there.
(08:18):
It's the whole story about how I finally get up
there and they're like, okay, put your foot outside and
you count to three and then we'll jump. And I
was like, cool, one faint and I'm like I'm already
fucking fine. I'm like, wait, what it was like you
can see the video. It's just like I just like
not off for like a second. And the first fucking
thing is have you skydived few times?
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Okay, So the first thing is your brain doesn't know
what the hell is going on, right, And then so
it's sort of kind of a sensor you're overloud. And
the second one is like, oh my god, I'm flying
through the air like a fucking bird. And then the
third one is like, please deploy, please deploy, please deploy.
But I think that everybody should do it at least
once in their life.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
What the scariest. The scariest part was the drive to
the airport for me. Yeah, yeah, but like every time
I've gone, I find it so peaceful, weirdly relaxing and
like just nothing else in the world matters.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
It doesn't feel like that that what's called the roller
coaster pole. It just feels like floating through the air. Yeah. Also,
I would like to shout out to our sponsors Tandem
Tandem Skydivings off Phillong Island. What if we're just this
is just a paid partnership I fucking for like Airlines,
German Airlines and Cark is throwing so Gunter got this
(09:31):
request approved right of somebody coming with him, but that
was something that everybody was going to regret because just
about everything that could go wrong went wrong. So at
first they took off in a dense fog and Gunta
couldn't see and flew thank you. Is that a fog sound? Yeah, oh,
that's a plain sound.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
I'm pretty sure that's a lawnmower.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
That's a lot so he was. He realized that he
was cutting the grass, and he flew purely by compass
right because he couldn't see anything. And while the military
observer guy had this his life flashing before his eyes.
It was the first time flying. It was the guy's
first time flying, and he was completely freaked out. It
forced them to land in the field and they couldn't
(10:11):
even leave until local farmers cut down trees to open
up a runway. Oh so what are you doing? Somebody
sending somebody who hasn't flown to supervise a flight, right? Like,
what would they what would how would they know what
to look for?
Speaker 2 (10:23):
We're still up in the air.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
Yeah, yes, it's good. Yeah, is flying big fighting boy? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (10:30):
So wait, so they're chilling in this town till they
cut down the trees to make over.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They had to land in a field and they couldn't
take off again until farmers came out and cut some
of the grass and vines and shit so that they
could take off again.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
That's like awesome, See what happens to humanity like that,
where you're like, huh, you're lost, I'll help you out.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
You know.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Well, listen, Billy, if a fucking guy landed with a
plane in my garden, I'd be like, yeah, I'm gonna
help you get the fuck out of my garden because
he's the weirdest thing I've ever seen. So I don't
know what's happened to I don't know if sweets humanity
or it's a it's just basically like, hey.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I I mean, I got I got some shit, I
gotta get done.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Get out.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Yeah yeah, so let's get get you out. So when
Gunter finally did launch again, another fog rolled in and
as they flew going to realize that somehow that forced
landing had split the fuel tank and then the gas
was leaking out of the plane right, So they ran
out of fuel just as they reached their destination. And
that was bad enough, but then on the way back.
Why are they fucking plying back?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Same plane?
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Hey, overlords, it's got to be a different plane, right.
Germany had like four planes at the time.
Speaker 5 (11:35):
So this was they just passed it out, ok, I
got so Gunter says that the only reason that he
tried taking off again was because he didn't know any
better at the time, and there was truly a shitty call.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
After a little while, he realized that the storm was
too strong and he couldn't control the plane, so he
tried to dive down and land in another field. I
love the farmers just looking at him.
Speaker 4 (11:54):
And like, nine, your set out best.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
And I imagine military observer right, like he's just confessing
to shit in case this is the last time.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
He's like, I've never like see you on the farm.
I said I did, but I didn't. It smucksy and
it makes me look fat, you know, and it's like, dude,
come down, I'm not gonna die.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
So they came in for the landing, but at last
minute the wind picked up and a gus slammed the
plane and flipped it upside down just to see near
the ground. The plane slammed into the field and smashed
forward with the wind and rain slashing them. The flip
plane cut a trench into the turf before crashing a
to a halt against a high mound. Not the best
first day for our military observer. Guy Gudur and his
(12:33):
passenger were trapped onto the plane as the storm ranged
on overhead, and as he caught his breath he realized
he was still alive. Right, Gunter felt hot gasoline start
pouring down his face. The observer is probably like, Okay,
I'm observing some fuel getting into your mouth, and there's
like you don't no need to observe everything here. This
guy was fucking lucky. So some nearby farmers again had
(12:55):
actually seen the plane go down. They rushed to the site.
They couldn't lift the plane, so they dug a tunnel
underneath it so they could pull out the trapman, What
has happened to humanity, Billy Magdison? Were people digging tunnels
for us these days? Nay, they don't exist. So Gunta
says that at that moment he realized that the mound
they had crashed the plane into was actually a giant
(13:17):
pile of manure. Fantastic, Yeah, what's the shitty? Have you
ever had a bad crash.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Uh yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Not like you're like, legally I cannot give your details
on it. I pleaded no.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
Contest, and I've always been lucky. Let's just say that
of like getting.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Out of stuff, Like I've been flown from a bike
and somehow landed like basically on all fours.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
You're landing like a gymnastic, like say, just like doing
the hoods in the air.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Like wow, falling rock climbing was the worst.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Probably what happened rock climbing, you almost died.
Speaker 3 (13:52):
I felt like I felt like maybe fifty feet no,
and like it was but luckily we were over water
and it was like there was this step weirdly, so
I fell.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
I felt like thirty something feet halfway down, and when.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
I hit my back, I kicked off away from the
wall because there was rocks and like I kicked off
far enough.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
To land in water, and so what Yeah, we out.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
The worst part wasn't the like my back and the
scars there from all that. It was the poison oak
that got into my bloodstream.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
No, I was like a scab for the next.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Two weeks ill you're like, what if you said like
the worst part of it was just you know, I
was my clothes got wet. That's really I was like,
well you really love your clothes. Well I'm glad you're alive. Brother,
So Gunter He says that the play was smashed up
into a tangle of wood, fabric and wire, and it
was fully broken apart in three places, and it was
(14:46):
completely embedded in soggy shit. Right, sorry, soggy poo poo.
Somehow going to escape with his life, and so did
his passenger. He had Billy magnuson. Look, so this is
his escape number one. Okay, okay, I really hope that
have is every time I name his escapes. Can I
give that one more time? Yes? Thank you. So in
(15:09):
this grace, both men took a train back to Gunter's
navy base to report. Their fellow officers were like, how
to go you know, and they're like, please fuck off.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
So now let's go back earlier.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
So they landed in a field, crashed in a field,
and they didn't just take the train back.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
They got back up in the air.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
No no, no, no, no, no no. They took the train back.
So they both both men took a first time where
the no, they got back up, They got back up
in the plane the first time they crashed into the field. Yeah,
they cut them off and they're like, okay, yeah, I
think that's as good boys.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
That's just like hitchhiking a ride is like, yeah, I'll
go back up. I'm just saying they could have taken
a train.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Yeah, they could have taken a train back, but they
just decided not to because they were like, maybe this
is what flying is. You have to like crash land
every now and then. You know, I also loved it, Like,
oh so it must be there must be some male
ego in play in this way. He's like, I will
not go into the fucking train. Everybody will know we
fucking chrished it. And it's like, I think everybody knows already.
It's in the news. Somehow, despite this, the Navy still
(16:13):
thought that they should send him to China as their
special pilot boy or vunderkind, if you will, And somehow
Gunter still thought that this was a good idea. Literally,
in his book, he ends the chapter of the crash
by saying, well, duty called, should you not wow? So
many terrible manure puns. I'm practicing for when I become
a farmer dad. You know, So, why did the German
(16:44):
navy send Gunta to China. Well, at the time, the
German navy had actually seized an entire city on the
Chinese coast in eighteen ninety seven, the city of Sin
Tau uhuh, named after the fantastic beer huh.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Yeah, because the German Kaiser was extremely jealous of his
cousins who ruled Russia and England, and they were all
taking parts in China for themselves. So you remember when
that morning career across Europe at that point was like
a messed up family affair, you know, and they're all like,
they're all basically like, no I wanted it, No I
wanted You know. That's really how World War for the
First World War happened. But how would you how would
your family do it? Ruling a continent? What do you think?
(17:21):
Imagine your family drama, but boosted by to scale to
scale a global empire.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Oh man, I think it would be a good time.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Yeah. Particular, your brothers sound like, you know, like there's conflict.
They're like, just get your head out of you ass, Hey, Russia,
just get your head out of ass. Let's go build
a house, guys, Let's go build some houses.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Build the house. Let's have a beer, enjoy ourselves.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So the German navy put the city under a military dictatorship.
So side, I wonder if it's related that there's a
beer named after that city, because Germans do love their
their brewing, don't they? To hey, overlords, is it related? Yes,
this is when the Germans built that brewery. Oh okay, okay, okay.
(18:03):
So I was right, good for me? So Wunderkin Gunta
was one of the navy officers who was sent to
China to be on the leadship of their Asian Navy squad.
And by the way, he had joined a German military
academy at ten years old, so this was kind of
his thing, right, And before he learned to fly, he
had already sailed around Sintau as a navy officer. In
(18:24):
that first trip, he even got himself a tattoo, a
dragon that stretched from his left shoulder all the way
to his left wrist. You got any ink I do? Yeah,
you don't regret any of them.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I don't think you've seen me with my clothes off.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
So do you? How many do you have?
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Four? All? I wish, I wish I didn't have any
of them.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
But listen, particularly like that, like early nineteen hundreds, it
must have been rare to get a big ass fucking
tattoo like that, right, I guess, but don't.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
Isn't like all the sailors would get tattoos all the
time and all that shit.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
I didn't associate with German navy guys. But I guess.
You know, you're on a boat, everything goes, you know.
So after his flying lessons and you know, crashing his
plane multiple times, Gunta was headed back to China for
his German overlords. He arrived in Saintao, this time with
a plane. Apparently he could fly now, and because of
the tattoo, people started calling him Gunta Dragonmaster, or at
(19:19):
least that's what Gunter would tell people. Do you think
that's even true? I love the idea of him like
dragon man. Yeah exactly. Yeah, Hey, hey Gunta Gunta fucking fine,
hey dragon master? Yeah yeah, but you're calling me, oh
my god.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
How are you this quick? Dude?
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Well, I have my I have writers in my ear.
It's Tory Smith and Alyssa just going like okay and
now bits bits bits bits okay, okay, thank you okay,
but also okay, so dragon Master he's pushing his nickname
on everybody. And this was July of nineteen fourteen. So
(20:00):
the other thing happening at the end of July nineteen
fourteen was that World War One was kicking off. As
a matter of fact, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot on
the same day that Gunta made his first flight over Sinhtau.
Oh coincidence, I think not? Where was he? So soon
enough Germany and Russia were scrapping. Apparently we'll talking with
(20:20):
an English girlfriend, Gunter told her that it was fine
Germany was fighting Russia because they would never fight England.
Oh how very wrong he was. So by the fall
that year, the German Sincintau were surrounded. Right, a combined
army of Japanese and English troops had the city under siege.
Did you expect the English to show up there?
Speaker 4 (20:42):
Like?
Speaker 1 (20:42):
It seemed like around that time. English would always go like, oh,
it's his sub education, yes please, I haven't.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Yeah, what's crazy is that that they they probably sailed
that whole way like at that time.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
Yeah, I mean, the air force wasn't that powerful, and
their navy has always been known for for being great.
So apparently in the attacks on the city. The Japanese
army was extremely careful not to damage the German brewery
because fucking priorities. I respect that. And in the battle,
Gunter was the German scout, so he would fly over
the city and report what he saw about the Japanese
(21:15):
and English shoops, where they were camped, how many there were,
things like that. But at first the soldiers mocked him,
saying that while they were fighting on the ground, he
was just playing games up in the air. The truth
is that Gunter's information was actually pretty useful, but the
insult stung, so he started to beg the German engineers
to figure out how to make bombs so he could
drop them from his plane. And what did they come
up with. They filled four pound coffee tins with sticks
(21:38):
to dynamite, with nails with scrap metal. Thank you, Ben,
and Gunter started carrying them up to the air with
him and throwing them over the side. This seems fucking insane.
Can you imagine carrying a coffee tin full of dynamite
on your lap while you drive, let alone fight up
into the air. That's awesome. I was gonna say, Billy's like, well,
if it showed up at that time in my life.
(21:59):
I'm just gonna say it.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
I'm to it.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
I mean there's people that drive with guns in the
cars here, man.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, it was different than that of my busy. I
see the point, Okay, I see the point.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
And these are those biplanes, like it has two things,
like it's open.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
Cockpit, the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And that's what I imagine because that's what the Red
Baron was known for, right, like from shooting it like fighting,
fighting in the air.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
When one of the the gun with the revolver comeing
or with the propeller, you know, when the gun with
the propeller. Yeah, so it was timed it would shoot
but through the spins of the blade.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
That was in nineteen fifteen. That was in nineteen fifteen.
We were a year ahead. So okay, so let's calm
the fuck down, Billy. Okay, you're ahead of the you're
ahead of the game. You're ahead of the game. So
unfortunately for everyone involved, the bombs were mostly duds. Right
at one point, he dropped his bomb in an English
military tent and it just like took a trampoline bounce
off the canvas. So it was really embarrassing, and then
(22:54):
just went into the mud, and when he would hit
Japanese ships, the bombs would also just bounce off it
without exploding, and Gunter says that all these failures made
him get over the first pleasant emotion of bombing. Fucking
the pleasant emotion of bombing really sounds like a memoir
by a fucking psychopath, or how you described the beginning
of my stand up career, Oh pleasure of bombing. Actually,
(23:15):
to be honest, my my only foray into stand up
comedy went very well, and I decided never to touch
it again. Have you ever tried that?
Speaker 2 (23:23):
Absolutely not? Have you heard? Have you heard me talk
of this podcast? And now I can do it.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
You're funny, You're funny in the group. You're good. You
know what, You're great board games man, You're great at
leading board games. Okay, and don't let anybody tell you differently, buddy.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
With Gunter doing exactly squat with the dumb bombs, the
siege of Sintau lasted for more than a month. The
Germans finally surrendered the city in November and Guncher had
one final mission, and he was given a package of
secret documents and told to fly south out of the city.
He launched into the air and traveled along the Chinese coast,
flying south for as long as he could. For those
counting at home, this is Gunter's escape number two. Okay,
(24:04):
find like a chicken from the siege of Singtau and
leaving behind all that delicious, delicious beer. Now eventually going
to was forced to land, so he did his signature
maneuver where he sent his plane nose down into a
nice mud patch. Despite his time in Sintau, Gunter didn't
speak any Chinese, so he needed an American missionary to
help him get into Shanghai. Have you ever regretted not
(24:25):
learning a language, Billy?
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Yes, so many great?
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Okay, I got two and a half a little bit
of French in my in my pocket, and I got
to what you got.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
I got French English in half of Spanish.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Half a Spanish. Just once you get Spanish, you automatically like,
are shoot in from the Portuguese and Italian kind of yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
You know, yeah, yeah, they're all romantic languages.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
We're romantic guys. So after he showed up Shanghai, a
meal freighter was scheduled to travel from Shanghai to California,
and Gunder got on board. He decided to travel as
an Englishman named mcgarvin, and.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
They were sure mcgarvin the dragon slayer.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
Yeah, the dragon guy, the dragon slayer. So they were
sure that the Americans wouldn't be able to tell the
difference between the German accent and an English accent, so
he wouldn't be in any danger, right, fucking audacity. On
the way, Gunja made the really strange choice to tell
other passengers well everything about himself, so that included giving
away all the details of his past false identity to
an American journalist on board. So when the ship docked
(25:34):
in Hawaii, the news got ahead of him right, and
by the time they landed in San Francisco in December,
newspapers around the country were publishing the story. Okay, so
the headlines, where are.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
The documents that he was like traveling with?
Speaker 1 (25:45):
He still got him in it, but he's telling everybody
what they contained.
Speaker 4 (25:48):
He's like, ah, were planning to attack on October fifth?
Speaker 2 (25:51):
That was heavy.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Yeah, you're going to bet that you have THEIRSVP. So
the news paper started publishing the story right, and the
headlines were like remarkable series of narrow escapes and said
that Gunter was pretending to be mcgarvin, and he was
trying to get back to Germany to fight the English, like,
whoa billy, have you ever let something slipt that was
supposed to stay secret?
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Everything? Okay, great, don't tell me a secret.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
No, I'm terrible at it too, like fucking unfold like
a table.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
I'm like, well everyone should know.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
Yeah, you're like no, no, no, guys, let's get it
out in the open. So now that basically the entire
country knew who he was, Gunta rushed to say ahead
of anyone who might want to grab him. He hopped
from train to train across the whole country. Right. He
was looking over his shoulder at every stop, being like,
why the fuck did I tell that journal is my secrets?
Now I'm being chased by the consequences of my own actions, summit,
but I am still to dragon Master cool Yah. His
(26:48):
panic jump from train to train finally brought him to
New York. Of course, he didn't have the right papers
from Atlantic crossing. He needed to find someone in the
city who could ford him a passport, tak him about
three weeks, and he was apparently pretty spread by the end.
So he says, the only thing.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
That call what neighborhood in New York. Do you think
it was?
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I don't know, but I think you know, he says
that the only thing that called these nerves is going
to see a performance of Hansel and Gretel at the
Metropolitan Opera. And that's a true story, Like this is
so soothing? Is this from Hansel and Gretel?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Jo.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
So eventually Gunta found a sketchy dude who would make
him a fake passport, and he bought a ticket to
Italy under the fake Swiss name, and souss, you can
find anything in New York. What's the weirdest thing you've
ever come across in New York City.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I remember getting on a subway and they had like
a iguana on a leash, like just someone like having
iguana on the leash in subway.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I was like, yeah, this makes sense.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
So now we're at escape number three. So Gunta gets
across America and it seemed like it was all working
out for Gunter, except that when the ship reached Europe,
it stopped at the English port of Gibraltar. And you
know how Gunter had always been telling people he was Swiss. Well,
one of the actual Swiss passengers on board didn't recognize
(28:12):
his accent. Dude, if I were a fugitive bro like,
people would think I'm a fucking mute, Like this guy
cannot shut the fuck up. He's like, yes, this is
the ascent. He's like, yes, this is the Swiss accent.
I am a Swiss guy.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
He sounds like a fucking Brad Pitt character anyway.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
But also, why is homeboy just being like that's not
a Swiss accent?
Speaker 2 (28:30):
So I should turn him in.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Yeah, you're like I thought the Swiss we're known for
like fucking being like, yeah, why don't you go fix
the clock? Do me a favorable buddy, go fix the
clock while I do my thing. So I'm sorry to
our Swiss audience of one person. So, even with his
fake Swiss passport, Gunter was arrested by English officers along
with a bunch of other Germans. Gunter was interrogated and
(28:53):
then shipped to England because he was now a prison
of war. So when he was finally locked up at
a prison of war camp in Plymouth on the southern
coast of England, Gunter said that the rules were made
to be broken. Well, yeah, everybody's brutles precknant.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
Yes, yes.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
So for example, obviously alcohol was forbidden for the prisoners
of war, but once the guards became friends who Gunter
and the other soldiers, they started smuggling them bottles of
beer and then things just escalated from there. They started
to let the chairman prisoners out to wander around the
town man and then what was really fucking crazy is
Gunter says that the English guards would even give them
(29:40):
guns so that they could practice rifle exercises together. I mean,
this sounds like a weird euphemism, but even if it's not,
it's hard to imagine things being any more lax, right.
Speaker 2 (29:51):
This is probably like a broke Back Mountain situation I
was having at that prison.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Maybe maybe Anyway, so things were completely loose at the
first prison, but Guncher kept complaining to the English guards
that he was an officer. He gave them his full
identity and said that he deserves special treatment, and in
England that fucking worked. So they apologized for a give
oh sorry, sorry, sorry sorry, They apologize for keeping in
with the soldiers for so long and send him to
an officer's camp outside of London, and Gunter says that
(30:17):
he was finally treated like a human being again, and
that the English warden of the officers tried to ease
the existence of the Germans said so, as Gunter tells it,
every two weeks at Taylor were dropped by the camp
and make them new clothes. They were also given a
monthly allowance of money, actual money, and they were all
like to write letters to Germany. What the fuck man
these guys are getting like tailored clothes because their officers
(30:39):
like so British aristocracy, isn't it. Well, if you'll be
a prisoner, Chopton, you must look the polit old boy.
So this only lasted until Gunter was transferred to a
new prison camp further inland, a place called Donnington Hall.
It was this old castle now being used to hold inmates,
and Gunter says that everyone was packed into cold stone
rooms and in his words, like pickled herrings. So obviously,
(31:02):
you know he couldn't stand for this, right, And after
one day when a deer somehow slipped inside the barbed
wire fence around the castle, Guntro was convinced that it
would be easy enough to slip out and escape. To
be honest, his plan was perfectly relatable. Right. He started
taking naps in the grass near the fence line. He
would lie on the grass gunto would watch the pattern
of his centuries right, he figured out that their patrol
(31:24):
roots and schedules were matching, and after two months of
his stay in Donnington Hall, Guntra had it all worked out.
He had spent every possible moment watching and waiting and
laying his plans. He even worked out a couple of
deals with the other prisoners to help him out. So
at the beginning of July, Gunta decided it was finally
time for escape number four.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
Thank you. Ben had to get that fourth one, Yeah,
you gotta get it. So step one, he says, he
prepared for the journey ahead by eating several substantial buttered rolls.
If you were going to go run for freedom, what
would you want to see your last meal?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Billy hell done us? Hell done us.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
It's a meal my grandmam eggs Lithuanian dish. It's basically
similar to perogi. Oh, but it's like a dough and
meat things. It's one of my favorite things. It's a
fantastic what's your last meal?
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Oh man? Probably fun, do you know, really? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Cheese or chocolate?
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Cheese and chocolate. I'm just gonna like have if I
can double dip, you know, I'll just be like because
I like the I'm like, if I'm gonna go out,
I'm gonna go out with like the I love the
custom of it, you know, pulling out a little bread,
pulling out the thing. I was just a classic guy.
What do you want me to tell you? And I
was like, So that night, during the evening roll call,
another prisoner laid in. Gunter sped and claimed to be
(32:41):
sick while Guntra and another German officer slipped over the
barbed wire fence under the cover of storm. They had
three rows of electrified barbed wire to cross right, but
Gunter and his companion had bundled themselves in thick leather
and they were able to scramble up and over, taking
a few scratches, but nothing worse. Gunter does say at
one point he tore a hole in the seat of
(33:01):
his trousers. How did they How did they even get
the thick leather leggings to you? Said, I don't fucking
want to know. So once they were on the road,
they had a close call as one of the prison
guards passed by Goldjer says that the two escapees behaved
like a rollicking pair of love birds and locked together
in a kiss, and they just heard that the guard
clicked his tongue and he went on by I love
(33:23):
the idea of Gonta taking it on for like longer
than necessary, because just because he was lonely, like bro, like, bro,
we been kissing for a while, Like you're sure he
can still see us, like yeah, yeah, Now tell me
I'm funny, I'm cute, loud, not tell me I'm beautiful. Please.
So Gujar had carried some normal clothes with him, along
with a razor and a few other things. So the
next morning, as the two escapees made their way toward
(33:45):
the nearest train station, they shaved, they changed clothes, and
climbed onto the train as normal passengers. They easily reached
London by noon and escaped Number four was complete. Gunder
knew the city he had visited before the war, and
he made his fine costume change into a dirty sailor
suit apparently, and he started looking around the docks for
a boat he could steal. It actually took him a
(34:07):
couple of weeks because in the meantime, Gonter says He
made sure to have a good time in London, right,
He went to the museums, eight in the pubs, and
he even saw at least one play. What would be
a show? Yea, He's like, I kind of get it off.
What would be one show that you risk your freedom
to go see your concert?
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I wish I got to see Yeah right before the pandemic.
I was going to see a rage against the machine.
They had just got back together. I would love to
see them live.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
Yeah. For me would be a Menuda reunion. I just
got to see him once. I talk about him all
the time.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
So might Minuda was different from Amenudo, didn't I?
Speaker 1 (34:44):
There you go your Spanish lie, you're du a linguist popping.
But all the fun and games had come to an end.
Gunta saw in the paper and that the other escapee
had been caught, and then the bricks were hot on
his trail. The police were searching for a man with
a large dragon tattoo on his left arm. So the
Dragonmaster finally had to go ahead and just start stealing
some fucking boats.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
Oh, I don't I thought you were going to say,
cut off his arm.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
He cut off it. I love it. I loved him
being like I knew I shouldn't have made people call
me dragon Master here too, like why did I do this?
I couldn't get enough of this nickname. So the first
boat that Gunter stole was about as successful as his
flying right. He climbed inside a little boat and pushed
off the dog bor. After a minute, he realized that
the boat was leaking, and he says that he tried
to paddle the Thames River exactly while it was going dry.
(35:31):
So by the end the river was empty and the
boat was full and he was completely stuck in the mud. Wow.
He says that he crawled through the mud back through
the river bank, where people walking by thought he was
drunk and just laughed at him for crawling around in
the mud. Seriously, has there ever been a more like
go home your drunk prison escape like book? Dude, like
fucking cash it in? But Gunja went down the river
(35:51):
and so the next night, as the tide was going out,
he found an unattended fishing boat, so he pushed out
into the English Channel. It was under the cover of
darkness he was able to paddle furiously toward a streamer
that was anchored off the coast. He reached it without
being seen, climbed aboard and stowed away, That is, escaped.
Number five, Gunter was finally on his way one bar
(36:15):
back to Germany. Gunto Pluscha, was the only German prisoner
to escape an English prisoner of war camp in either
World War One or World War Two, or at least
that's a story. So in total, his journey from Sintau
across America, into the English pow camps, and then finally
back into Germany had taken only nine months. In nineteen
(36:37):
twenty two, Yeah, Gunter published a book in English called
My Escape from Dunnington Hall, and it gave a detailed
story of his life. It is you might not be
surprised to hear extremely racist about people he met in China,
and this is so I want to recommend people reading it.
But he spends a lot of time talking about how
great Germany is and how how much he loves German
(36:57):
Emperor and the prestige of the white race. Oh that's nice,
Oh that's so good for you, gunt. There's a lot
of extravotion about like darling blonde hair and wonderful blue
eyes and wait a minute, was he describing you Billy
He's like, one day there was a born a man
who builds houses with beautiful blue eyes. I don't even
know are your eyes blue or green?
Speaker 6 (37:16):
They're blue. Guncher's my uncle. After his escape, Gunte took
up flying again. When the war ended, he started sailing too.
He started going to his favorite German destination, Argentina. Bro
German soldiers love Argentina like they love It's wild.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
It's wild how many blond babies were born in nineteen
forty six down there? You know. Obviously guy was truly
a trailerbilizer for Nazis. You know. On one of his trip,
Gunter even brought a camera with him and made a
silent film called in Wilde Fluges zu unzbucken Belton, Oh
sorry Germans or flying in Pictures to Unknown Worlds.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
No I thought it translated to one percent that bitch.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
That's what it is. It was a Lisso song, an
early version of a Lisso song. So it follows his
journey Coloss the Atlantic, showing him flying and has some
early airborne footage of Tierra al Felo. It's all up
on YouTube at this point if you want to check
it out. And apparently it was a huge hit in
Germany in the nineteen thirties. So all these things bring
us to the end of his life and he guesses
for how Guntar is going to die? Dduh.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
It costs like chokes on something in sleep.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
No no, no, no no. He was flying. He was
flying his plane on Argandina, of course, and once he
was up over the mountains, he lost control for what
felt like the million times. But the self proclaimed Dragonmaster
had run out of luck. It was nineteen thirty one
when Gunta finally went down in the mountains of Patagonia.
Only this time, instead of the plane flying into a
(38:44):
pile of shit, it was a pile of shit flying
into a mountain. Oh and that's it, buddy. Wow, What
are the takeaways? What are the takeaways of this story?
For you, my friend?
Speaker 3 (39:04):
To get out of any situation you need just some
careen love.
Speaker 1 (39:08):
That's it, man. And so now let me do a
little plug. Okay, So listeners can find you in the
film Lift on Netflix, Roadhouse on Amazon, the franchise on HBO,
and later this year, Leelo and Stitch live action remake Roadhouse,
Roadhouse Baby. Check it out Roadhouse, And so listen, let
me know if you're into this, but to play us out.
I would like for them to play as a song
(39:28):
and for us to kind of try to reenact a conversation,
a conversation or a song, because I hear you have
a beautiful voice, So a song would go between Gunter
and maybe his military observer up in the air for
the first time. You want to try it? Okay, give
us some music. Do you see a mountain down there?
(39:51):
Should we go down there?
Speaker 4 (39:53):
Is it destiny that Wi Kings is really cold in
the back seat?
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Can you open stuff window?
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (40:00):
They're on the windows because there is the open air cockpit.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
Yeah, I got na cross, I got that crusters you
want to crush? You want to custer? You see that?
Would you like to go? Man? God, thank you Bailey,
Thank you so much. Brother. That was so fucking funny.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Do some amazing shit.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Man, brother, I have all the love for you. I
appreciate you doing this, Thank you for being so open
with us. And I can't wait for us to do
another fucking film together. Man, I really truly can't wait. Ah. Yeah, anytime,
all right, brother, thank you? And that's great. As escapes,
We're out. Gradi'st Escapes is a production of iHeart Radio
(40:41):
and Film Nation Entertainment in association with Gilded Audio. Our
executive producers for me are Turo Castro, Alyssa Martino and
Milan Papelka from Film Nation Entertainment, Andrew Chug and Winning
Donaldson from Gilded Audio, and Dylan Fagan from iHeartRadio. The
show was produced and edited by Carl Nellis and Ben Chugg,
who are also, respectively, our research overlord and music overlord.
(41:01):
Our associate producer is Tory Smith, who's our other overlord.
Nick Dooley is our technical director. Additional editing by Whitney Donaldson.
Special thanks to Alison Cohen, Dan Welsh, Ben Riiseek, Sarah Joyner,
Nicky Stein, Olivia Canny and Kelsey Albright. Hey, thank you
(41:30):
so much for listening, and if you're enjoying the show,
please drop a rating or review. My mom will call
you each personally and thank you, and we'll see you
all next week.
This is as great as Escapes, a show bringing you
the wildest true escape stories of all time. I'm Attura
Castro and I'm here with the incredibly talented actor with
the voice of an absolute angel, Billy Magnuson. Guys, what
(00:41):
a treat we have for you today. We have the one,
the only Billy Magnusse. So, brother, thank you so much
for doing this. I really appreciate it. You and Georgia
right now building a house from from from the ground up, by.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yourself, renovating, renovating.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
No, no, no, you're building a house by yourself because
you're impressively fun.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
This admitted with my brothers. Actually it's actually with my
brothers and my dad. You know, grew up in a
carpentry shop.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
So are you renovating a house you grew up in
or a house you got in Georgia?
Speaker 2 (01:17):
No, house I got in Georgia. It's like close to
my parents' place.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
So you know, when I'm not shooting a movie with
you co starring next to you, you know, I'm building houses.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Work in construction, that's all. You're doing a movie or
you're building a house. That's what building Magison does.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
All right, that's it. What else is there to do?
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Do you have something that you considered to be your
greatest escape?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Brother, My biggest real escape was like probably getting away
from a life I didn't want to live. I would say, like,
I'm emotionally and deep. We came from the generation a
little bit before social media and shit like that, and
that that comparison thing that it causes, or at least
it caused me to do fucking crushed me me and
(02:00):
like detox from that and not do that shit. It's
been so helpful.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Try try having the only other well known Watermellon actor
be Oscar Isaac. I mean every time every time I
did something even semi cool, my friends would send me
like the cover of a GQ with like an Oscar eyesagon,
and I was like, yep, got it, got it, got it.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
There was something about my own trust and like caring
for myself, I stop doing and to like move on,
move past that and escape that that black hole of it.
That's been the best escape in my life to enjoy life.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Again. Thank you for being so open with us, man.
Did you ever get faced with the like like unsmoking,
what do you have to complain about? Not from your
family but from other people sometimes Yeah, no.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
No, definitely from my family.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
But again I come from the majority of dudes that
you know, it's my mom and then like four guys
and that sounds weird.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
It's me and my brothers, you know, a bunch of
dudes that I just.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
Got some guys that I just build some house.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Yeah, but you know, David was just get your head
out of your ass and put yourself up, like what
do you got. Look, it's fucking beautiful today when you
get outside. It was tough love, okay. Escape was just yeah,
saying goodbye to that that life that wasn't working anymore,
or that mindset.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Well, brother, listen, thank you so much for opening up
about that. Are you ready for me to tell you
an insane escape? Brother?
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, that's rock and roll. So our story begins with
a man named Gunta Pluschkau. He was this German naval
officer in the early nineteen hundreds, and honestly, his life
was like a whole series of buck wild escapes. Eventually
he would even become one of the most famous prisoners
of World War One. We're going to start in the
(03:45):
year before the war started, when Gunta was assigned to
a brand new wing of the German military, the Air Force.
So of course this was when they were first starting
to experiment with flying. And it turns out the Gunta
was an absolute prodigy. So at the beginning of nineteen fourteen,
Gunter's story really took off. Because it's hard to say
(04:07):
this to believe, Gunter says it only took him three
days to learn how to fly. He was like, yeah,
I don't know. I just spent up in the air
and I stayed there like boom came down. It's very simple.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
I actually feel like flying is probably very like second
act or like riding a bike. Weirdly, I remember doing
a hanglighting thing and I was like, this makes so much.
It's like the mechanics of it really actually works in
my head.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
And you're in this nothing.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Kind of contraption, you know, it's just right the wind,
and it was just like this seems so simple.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Like you were simple what you're just feeling what the
air wanted to do, and you're just kind of like, oh,
this is how I can manipulate it, right.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
Yeah, you just it's like surfing or something, you know,
like where you have to or snowboarding or skiing. You
could just feel where the momentum wants to take you.
It's like little dancing in the air. It makes sense
to me, so listen.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
So the German place of that time, they were called doves,
and they were fucking janky as hell, right, and they
required the pilot to do a lot of pulling on
wires and levers to make the wingspend. But Gunter says
that not only could he do it after just three days,
but he actually passed his flying exam on day five.
Do you have any prodigy level skills, Billy? Were you
immediately proficient at that uh what they called the goat
(05:19):
carcass throwing race?
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well, coke peru co Yeah, no, definitely, not definitely. Not
that that was like showing up.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
That was like we were the Jamaican Bob sled team
showing up to like, you know, play coke peru. Coke
preau is a game basically during the World Nomad Games.
It's like one of the biggest sports in the stands.
And that was part of the first ever American coke
carew team, which is basically hockey like the same rules
as hockey, but you're on horseback and the balls of
dead goat carcass and you have to lean off the
(05:49):
horse to the ground, pick up the dead goat carcass
and throw it in the other team's goal.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
And it was the most aggressive thing I've ever done
in my life.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Oh my god, is it is it shaped as a
ball or is it just literally like right.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Before, right before the game, cut off the head and
cut off at the elbows and knees. Oh my gosh,
and blood everything, Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (06:11):
But then the winner gets to eat it.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Wow, that's fucking insane.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
That is insane.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
The German Air Force was so impressed with Gunta's prodigious
skills that they wanted to immediately ship him off to
the far reaches of the Empire. But Gunta must have
felt that he wasn't actually ready, so he made a
request before they sent him away. He asked for one
more long training flight across Germany, but this time joined
by a military observer. Yeah, if you're belief you're the
(06:41):
observer guy, you're gonna take this fucking flight with a
hotch a young pilot. I'd be like, fuck, no, man,
I'm busy avoiding syphilis and I don't want to die.
I was like, you know, it's like nineteen hundred.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Man, I just wanted my schnitzel and some beer.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Yeah, I got polio. Dude, I can't do that.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
I guess I would do it though I'm that kind
of guy.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Though you would, you would definitely do it.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
I like things in my life always show up, Like
if it shows up in front of me, I'm like,
this is the moment I'm doing.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
That now, you know. It's yeah, yeah, It's like.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Eating bugs for the first time in like Highland.
Speaker 3 (07:10):
It just like shows up to you and you're like, eh, yes,
I'm doing this here.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
I'm a bugget to know, you know. I find that
with like weird phobias that i have, like afraid of
heights or whatever the fuck. But even though I'm afraid
of heights, I've cliff dived and I've skydived, and I've
you know, because I'm more afraid of missing out on
the experience than i am up my petty little fears,
if that makes any sense exactly, Dude.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I could not agree with you more. Would you ever
actually get your skydiving license?
Speaker 1 (07:35):
My girlfriend at the time didn't fucking know that I
was afraid of heights, and she got me a skydiving
thing for my birthday. But my birthday is in November,
and in New York you can't jump until June. So
I had about seven eight months to think about this
fucking thing, and I was like, I'm not gonna do it.
I'm not gonna do it. I'm not going to do it.
Two weeks before, there was an accident for a tandem
skydiving thing where the parents who didn't fully deploy and
(07:57):
so the dude landing on his client, and Vaporice is
client and he kind of survived, all fucked up, and
I was like, that's it. That's it. I'm not doing it.
And then my writing partner, who is at the time
who is the softest dude I've ever met, he was like, oh,
scot of yeah, I've been like four times. I was like,
there's no fucking world in which this market has gone
and I have not gone. Anyway, we go up there.
(08:18):
It's the whole story about how I finally get up
there and they're like, okay, put your foot outside and
you count to three and then we'll jump. And I
was like, cool, one faint and I'm like I'm already
fucking fine. I'm like, wait, what it was like you
can see the video. It's just like I just like
not off for like a second. And the first fucking
thing is have you skydived few times?
Speaker 4 (08:39):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Okay, So the first thing is your brain doesn't know
what the hell is going on, right, And then so
it's sort of kind of a sensor you're overloud. And
the second one is like, oh my god, I'm flying
through the air like a fucking bird. And then the
third one is like, please deploy, please deploy, please deploy.
But I think that everybody should do it at least
once in their life.
Speaker 3 (08:54):
What the scariest. The scariest part was the drive to
the airport for me. Yeah, yeah, but like every time
I've gone, I find it so peaceful, weirdly relaxing and
like just nothing else in the world matters.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
It doesn't feel like that that what's called the roller
coaster pole. It just feels like floating through the air. Yeah. Also,
I would like to shout out to our sponsors Tandem
Tandem Skydivings off Phillong Island. What if we're just this
is just a paid partnership I fucking for like Airlines,
German Airlines and Cark is throwing so Gunter got this
(09:31):
request approved right of somebody coming with him, but that
was something that everybody was going to regret because just
about everything that could go wrong went wrong. So at
first they took off in a dense fog and Gunta
couldn't see and flew thank you. Is that a fog sound? Yeah, oh,
that's a plain sound.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
I'm pretty sure that's a lawnmower.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
That's a lot so he was. He realized that he
was cutting the grass, and he flew purely by compass
right because he couldn't see anything. And while the military
observer guy had this his life flashing before his eyes.
It was the first time flying. It was the guy's
first time flying, and he was completely freaked out. It
forced them to land in the field and they couldn't
(10:11):
even leave until local farmers cut down trees to open
up a runway. Oh so what are you doing? Somebody
sending somebody who hasn't flown to supervise a flight, right? Like,
what would they what would how would they know what
to look for?
Speaker 2 (10:23):
We're still up in the air.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
Yeah, yes, it's good. Yeah, is flying big fighting boy? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (10:30):
So wait, so they're chilling in this town till they
cut down the trees to make over.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They had to land in a field and they couldn't
take off again until farmers came out and cut some
of the grass and vines and shit so that they
could take off again.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
That's like awesome, See what happens to humanity like that,
where you're like, huh, you're lost, I'll help you out.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
You know.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Well, listen, Billy, if a fucking guy landed with a
plane in my garden, I'd be like, yeah, I'm gonna
help you get the fuck out of my garden because
he's the weirdest thing I've ever seen. So I don't
know what's happened to I don't know if sweets humanity
or it's a it's just basically like, hey.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
I I mean, I got I got some shit, I
gotta get done.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Get out.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Yeah yeah, so let's get get you out. So when
Gunter finally did launch again, another fog rolled in and
as they flew going to realize that somehow that forced
landing had split the fuel tank and then the gas
was leaking out of the plane right, So they ran
out of fuel just as they reached their destination. And
that was bad enough, but then on the way back.
Why are they fucking plying back?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Same plane?
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Hey, overlords, it's got to be a different plane, right.
Germany had like four planes at the time.
Speaker 5 (11:35):
So this was they just passed it out, ok, I
got so Gunter says that the only reason that he
tried taking off again was because he didn't know any
better at the time, and there was truly a shitty call.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
After a little while, he realized that the storm was
too strong and he couldn't control the plane, so he
tried to dive down and land in another field. I
love the farmers just looking at him.
Speaker 4 (11:54):
And like, nine, your set out best.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
And I imagine military observer right, like he's just confessing
to shit in case this is the last time.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
He's like, I've never like see you on the farm.
I said I did, but I didn't. It smucksy and
it makes me look fat, you know, and it's like, dude,
come down, I'm not gonna die.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
So they came in for the landing, but at last
minute the wind picked up and a gus slammed the
plane and flipped it upside down just to see near
the ground. The plane slammed into the field and smashed
forward with the wind and rain slashing them. The flip
plane cut a trench into the turf before crashing a
to a halt against a high mound. Not the best
first day for our military observer. Guy Gudur and his
(12:33):
passenger were trapped onto the plane as the storm ranged
on overhead, and as he caught his breath he realized
he was still alive. Right, Gunter felt hot gasoline start
pouring down his face. The observer is probably like, Okay,
I'm observing some fuel getting into your mouth, and there's
like you don't no need to observe everything here. This
guy was fucking lucky. So some nearby farmers again had
(12:55):
actually seen the plane go down. They rushed to the site.
They couldn't lift the plane, so they dug a tunnel
underneath it so they could pull out the trapman, What
has happened to humanity, Billy Magdison? Were people digging tunnels
for us these days? Nay, they don't exist. So Gunta
says that at that moment he realized that the mound
they had crashed the plane into was actually a giant
(13:17):
pile of manure. Fantastic, Yeah, what's the shitty? Have you
ever had a bad crash.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Uh yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
Not like you're like, legally I cannot give your details
on it. I pleaded no.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
Contest, and I've always been lucky. Let's just say that
of like getting.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Out of stuff, Like I've been flown from a bike
and somehow landed like basically on all fours.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
You're landing like a gymnastic, like say, just like doing
the hoods in the air.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Like wow, falling rock climbing was the worst.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
Probably what happened rock climbing, you almost died.
Speaker 3 (13:52):
I felt like I felt like maybe fifty feet no,
and like it was but luckily we were over water
and it was like there was this step weirdly, so
I fell.
Speaker 2 (14:02):
I felt like thirty something feet halfway down, and when.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
I hit my back, I kicked off away from the
wall because there was rocks and like I kicked off
far enough.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
To land in water, and so what Yeah, we out.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
The worst part wasn't the like my back and the
scars there from all that. It was the poison oak
that got into my bloodstream.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
No, I was like a scab for the next.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Two weeks ill you're like, what if you said like
the worst part of it was just you know, I
was my clothes got wet. That's really I was like,
well you really love your clothes. Well I'm glad you're alive. Brother,
So Gunter He says that the play was smashed up
into a tangle of wood, fabric and wire, and it
was fully broken apart in three places, and it was
(14:46):
completely embedded in soggy shit. Right, sorry, soggy poo poo.
Somehow going to escape with his life, and so did
his passenger. He had Billy magnuson. Look, so this is
his escape number one. Okay, okay, I really hope that
have is every time I name his escapes. Can I
give that one more time? Yes? Thank you. So in
(15:09):
this grace, both men took a train back to Gunter's
navy base to report. Their fellow officers were like, how
to go you know, and they're like, please fuck off.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
So now let's go back earlier.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
So they landed in a field, crashed in a field,
and they didn't just take the train back.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
They got back up in the air.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
No no, no, no, no, no no. They took the train back.
So they both both men took a first time where
the no, they got back up, They got back up
in the plane the first time they crashed into the field. Yeah,
they cut them off and they're like, okay, yeah, I
think that's as good boys.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
That's just like hitchhiking a ride is like, yeah, I'll
go back up. I'm just saying they could have taken
a train.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Yeah, they could have taken a train back, but they
just decided not to because they were like, maybe this
is what flying is. You have to like crash land
every now and then. You know, I also loved it, Like,
oh so it must be there must be some male
ego in play in this way. He's like, I will
not go into the fucking train. Everybody will know we
fucking chrished it. And it's like, I think everybody knows already.
It's in the news. Somehow, despite this, the Navy still
(16:13):
thought that they should send him to China as their
special pilot boy or vunderkind, if you will, And somehow
Gunter still thought that this was a good idea. Literally,
in his book, he ends the chapter of the crash
by saying, well, duty called, should you not wow? So
many terrible manure puns. I'm practicing for when I become
a farmer dad. You know, So, why did the German
(16:44):
navy send Gunta to China. Well, at the time, the
German navy had actually seized an entire city on the
Chinese coast in eighteen ninety seven, the city of Sin
Tau uhuh, named after the fantastic beer huh.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Yeah, because the German Kaiser was extremely jealous of his
cousins who ruled Russia and England, and they were all
taking parts in China for themselves. So you remember when
that morning career across Europe at that point was like
a messed up family affair, you know, and they're all like,
they're all basically like, no I wanted it, No I
wanted You know. That's really how World War for the
First World War happened. But how would you how would
your family do it? Ruling a continent? What do you think?
(17:21):
Imagine your family drama, but boosted by to scale to
scale a global empire.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Oh man, I think it would be a good time.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Yeah. Particular, your brothers sound like, you know, like there's conflict.
They're like, just get your head out of you ass, Hey, Russia,
just get your head out of ass. Let's go build
a house, guys, Let's go build some houses.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Build the house. Let's have a beer, enjoy ourselves.
Speaker 1 (17:42):
So the German navy put the city under a military dictatorship.
So side, I wonder if it's related that there's a
beer named after that city, because Germans do love their
their brewing, don't they? To hey, overlords, is it related? Yes,
this is when the Germans built that brewery. Oh okay, okay, okay.
(18:03):
So I was right, good for me? So Wunderkin Gunta
was one of the navy officers who was sent to
China to be on the leadship of their Asian Navy squad.
And by the way, he had joined a German military
academy at ten years old, so this was kind of
his thing, right, And before he learned to fly, he
had already sailed around Sintau as a navy officer. In
(18:24):
that first trip, he even got himself a tattoo, a
dragon that stretched from his left shoulder all the way
to his left wrist. You got any ink I do? Yeah,
you don't regret any of them.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
I don't think you've seen me with my clothes off.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
So do you? How many do you have?
Speaker 2 (18:41):
Four? All? I wish, I wish I didn't have any
of them.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
But listen, particularly like that, like early nineteen hundreds, it
must have been rare to get a big ass fucking
tattoo like that, right, I guess, but don't.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
Isn't like all the sailors would get tattoos all the
time and all that shit.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
I didn't associate with German navy guys. But I guess.
You know, you're on a boat, everything goes, you know.
So after his flying lessons and you know, crashing his
plane multiple times, Gunta was headed back to China for
his German overlords. He arrived in Saintao, this time with
a plane. Apparently he could fly now, and because of
the tattoo, people started calling him Gunta Dragonmaster, or at
(19:19):
least that's what Gunter would tell people. Do you think
that's even true? I love the idea of him like
dragon man. Yeah exactly. Yeah, Hey, hey Gunta Gunta fucking fine,
hey dragon master? Yeah yeah, but you're calling me, oh
my god.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
How are you this quick? Dude?
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Well, I have my I have writers in my ear.
It's Tory Smith and Alyssa just going like okay and
now bits bits bits bits okay, okay, thank you okay,
but also okay, so dragon Master he's pushing his nickname
on everybody. And this was July of nineteen fourteen. So
(20:00):
the other thing happening at the end of July nineteen
fourteen was that World War One was kicking off. As
a matter of fact, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot on
the same day that Gunta made his first flight over Sinhtau.
Oh coincidence, I think not? Where was he? So soon
enough Germany and Russia were scrapping. Apparently we'll talking with
(20:20):
an English girlfriend, Gunter told her that it was fine
Germany was fighting Russia because they would never fight England.
Oh how very wrong he was. So by the fall
that year, the German Sincintau were surrounded. Right, a combined
army of Japanese and English troops had the city under siege.
Did you expect the English to show up there?
Speaker 4 (20:42):
Like?
Speaker 1 (20:42):
It seemed like around that time. English would always go like, oh,
it's his sub education, yes please, I haven't.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
Yeah, what's crazy is that that they they probably sailed
that whole way like at that time.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
Yeah, I mean, the air force wasn't that powerful, and
their navy has always been known for for being great.
So apparently in the attacks on the city. The Japanese
army was extremely careful not to damage the German brewery
because fucking priorities. I respect that. And in the battle,
Gunter was the German scout, so he would fly over
the city and report what he saw about the Japanese
(21:15):
and English shoops, where they were camped, how many there were,
things like that. But at first the soldiers mocked him,
saying that while they were fighting on the ground, he
was just playing games up in the air. The truth
is that Gunter's information was actually pretty useful, but the
insult stung, so he started to beg the German engineers
to figure out how to make bombs so he could
drop them from his plane. And what did they come
up with. They filled four pound coffee tins with sticks
(21:38):
to dynamite, with nails with scrap metal. Thank you, Ben,
and Gunter started carrying them up to the air with
him and throwing them over the side. This seems fucking insane.
Can you imagine carrying a coffee tin full of dynamite
on your lap while you drive, let alone fight up
into the air. That's awesome. I was gonna say, Billy's like, well,
if it showed up at that time in my life.
(21:59):
I'm just gonna say it.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
I'm to it.
Speaker 3 (22:02):
I mean there's people that drive with guns in the
cars here, man.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, it was different than that of my busy. I
see the point, Okay, I see the point.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
And these are those biplanes, like it has two things,
like it's open.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
Cockpit, the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And that's what I imagine because that's what the Red
Baron was known for, right, like from shooting it like fighting,
fighting in the air.
Speaker 3 (22:19):
When one of the the gun with the revolver comeing
or with the propeller, you know, when the gun with
the propeller. Yeah, so it was timed it would shoot
but through the spins of the blade.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
That was in nineteen fifteen. That was in nineteen fifteen.
We were a year ahead. So okay, so let's calm
the fuck down, Billy. Okay, you're ahead of the you're
ahead of the game. You're ahead of the game. So
unfortunately for everyone involved, the bombs were mostly duds. Right
at one point, he dropped his bomb in an English
military tent and it just like took a trampoline bounce
off the canvas. So it was really embarrassing, and then
(22:54):
just went into the mud, and when he would hit
Japanese ships, the bombs would also just bounce off it
without exploding, and Gunter says that all these failures made
him get over the first pleasant emotion of bombing. Fucking
the pleasant emotion of bombing really sounds like a memoir
by a fucking psychopath, or how you described the beginning
of my stand up career, Oh pleasure of bombing. Actually,
(23:15):
to be honest, my my only foray into stand up
comedy went very well, and I decided never to touch
it again. Have you ever tried that?
Speaker 2 (23:23):
Absolutely not? Have you heard? Have you heard me talk
of this podcast? And now I can do it.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
You're funny, You're funny in the group. You're good. You
know what, You're great board games man, You're great at
leading board games. Okay, and don't let anybody tell you differently, buddy.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
With Gunter doing exactly squat with the dumb bombs, the
siege of Sintau lasted for more than a month. The
Germans finally surrendered the city in November and Guncher had
one final mission, and he was given a package of
secret documents and told to fly south out of the city.
He launched into the air and traveled along the Chinese coast,
flying south for as long as he could. For those
counting at home, this is Gunter's escape number two. Okay,
(24:04):
find like a chicken from the siege of Singtau and
leaving behind all that delicious, delicious beer. Now eventually going
to was forced to land, so he did his signature
maneuver where he sent his plane nose down into a
nice mud patch. Despite his time in Sintau, Gunter didn't
speak any Chinese, so he needed an American missionary to
help him get into Shanghai. Have you ever regretted not
(24:25):
learning a language, Billy?
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Yes, so many great?
Speaker 1 (24:30):
Okay, I got two and a half a little bit
of French in my in my pocket, and I got
to what you got.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
I got French English in half of Spanish.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Half a Spanish. Just once you get Spanish, you automatically like,
are shoot in from the Portuguese and Italian kind of yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
You know, yeah, yeah, they're all romantic languages.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
We're romantic guys. So after he showed up Shanghai, a
meal freighter was scheduled to travel from Shanghai to California,
and Gunder got on board. He decided to travel as
an Englishman named mcgarvin, and.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
They were sure mcgarvin the dragon slayer.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
Yeah, the dragon guy, the dragon slayer. So they were
sure that the Americans wouldn't be able to tell the
difference between the German accent and an English accent, so
he wouldn't be in any danger, right, fucking audacity. On
the way, Gunja made the really strange choice to tell
other passengers well everything about himself, so that included giving
away all the details of his past false identity to
an American journalist on board. So when the ship docked
(25:34):
in Hawaii, the news got ahead of him right, and
by the time they landed in San Francisco in December,
newspapers around the country were publishing the story. Okay, so
the headlines, where are.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
The documents that he was like traveling with?
Speaker 1 (25:45):
He still got him in it, but he's telling everybody
what they contained.
Speaker 4 (25:48):
He's like, ah, were planning to attack on October fifth?
Speaker 2 (25:51):
That was heavy.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Yeah, you're going to bet that you have THEIRSVP. So
the news paper started publishing the story right, and the
headlines were like remarkable series of narrow escapes and said
that Gunter was pretending to be mcgarvin, and he was
trying to get back to Germany to fight the English, like,
whoa billy, have you ever let something slipt that was
supposed to stay secret?
Speaker 2 (26:15):
Everything? Okay, great, don't tell me a secret.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
No, I'm terrible at it too, like fucking unfold like
a table.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
I'm like, well everyone should know.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
Yeah, you're like no, no, no, guys, let's get it
out in the open. So now that basically the entire
country knew who he was, Gunta rushed to say ahead
of anyone who might want to grab him. He hopped
from train to train across the whole country. Right. He
was looking over his shoulder at every stop, being like,
why the fuck did I tell that journal is my secrets?
Now I'm being chased by the consequences of my own actions, summit,
but I am still to dragon Master cool Yah. His
(26:48):
panic jump from train to train finally brought him to
New York. Of course, he didn't have the right papers
from Atlantic crossing. He needed to find someone in the
city who could ford him a passport, tak him about
three weeks, and he was apparently pretty spread by the end.
So he says, the only thing.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
That call what neighborhood in New York. Do you think
it was?
Speaker 1 (27:04):
I don't know, but I think you know, he says
that the only thing that called these nerves is going
to see a performance of Hansel and Gretel at the
Metropolitan Opera. And that's a true story, Like this is
so soothing? Is this from Hansel and Gretel?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Jo.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
So eventually Gunta found a sketchy dude who would make
him a fake passport, and he bought a ticket to
Italy under the fake Swiss name, and souss, you can
find anything in New York. What's the weirdest thing you've
ever come across in New York City.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I remember getting on a subway and they had like
a iguana on a leash, like just someone like having
iguana on the leash in subway.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
I was like, yeah, this makes sense.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
So now we're at escape number three. So Gunta gets
across America and it seemed like it was all working
out for Gunter, except that when the ship reached Europe,
it stopped at the English port of Gibraltar. And you
know how Gunter had always been telling people he was Swiss. Well,
one of the actual Swiss passengers on board didn't recognize
(28:12):
his accent. Dude, if I were a fugitive bro like,
people would think I'm a fucking mute, Like this guy
cannot shut the fuck up. He's like, yes, this is
the ascent. He's like, yes, this is the Swiss accent.
I am a Swiss guy.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
He sounds like a fucking Brad Pitt character anyway.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
But also, why is homeboy just being like that's not
a Swiss accent?
Speaker 2 (28:30):
So I should turn him in.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
Yeah, you're like I thought the Swiss we're known for
like fucking being like, yeah, why don't you go fix
the clock? Do me a favorable buddy, go fix the
clock while I do my thing. So I'm sorry to
our Swiss audience of one person. So, even with his
fake Swiss passport, Gunter was arrested by English officers along
with a bunch of other Germans. Gunter was interrogated and
(28:53):
then shipped to England because he was now a prison
of war. So when he was finally locked up at
a prison of war camp in Plymouth on the southern
coast of England, Gunter said that the rules were made
to be broken. Well, yeah, everybody's brutles precknant.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
Yes, yes.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
So for example, obviously alcohol was forbidden for the prisoners
of war, but once the guards became friends who Gunter
and the other soldiers, they started smuggling them bottles of
beer and then things just escalated from there. They started
to let the chairman prisoners out to wander around the
town man and then what was really fucking crazy is
Gunter says that the English guards would even give them
(29:40):
guns so that they could practice rifle exercises together. I mean,
this sounds like a weird euphemism, but even if it's not,
it's hard to imagine things being any more lax, right.
Speaker 2 (29:51):
This is probably like a broke Back Mountain situation I
was having at that prison.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Maybe maybe Anyway, so things were completely loose at the
first prison, but Guncher kept complaining to the English guards
that he was an officer. He gave them his full
identity and said that he deserves special treatment, and in
England that fucking worked. So they apologized for a give
oh sorry, sorry, sorry sorry, They apologize for keeping in
with the soldiers for so long and send him to
an officer's camp outside of London, and Gunter says that
(30:17):
he was finally treated like a human being again, and
that the English warden of the officers tried to ease
the existence of the Germans said so, as Gunter tells it,
every two weeks at Taylor were dropped by the camp
and make them new clothes. They were also given a
monthly allowance of money, actual money, and they were all
like to write letters to Germany. What the fuck man
these guys are getting like tailored clothes because their officers
(30:39):
like so British aristocracy, isn't it. Well, if you'll be
a prisoner, Chopton, you must look the polit old boy.
So this only lasted until Gunter was transferred to a
new prison camp further inland, a place called Donnington Hall.
It was this old castle now being used to hold inmates,
and Gunter says that everyone was packed into cold stone
rooms and in his words, like pickled herrings. So obviously,
(31:02):
you know he couldn't stand for this, right, And after
one day when a deer somehow slipped inside the barbed
wire fence around the castle, Guntro was convinced that it
would be easy enough to slip out and escape. To
be honest, his plan was perfectly relatable. Right. He started
taking naps in the grass near the fence line. He
would lie on the grass gunto would watch the pattern
of his centuries right, he figured out that their patrol
(31:24):
roots and schedules were matching, and after two months of
his stay in Donnington Hall, Guntra had it all worked out.
He had spent every possible moment watching and waiting and
laying his plans. He even worked out a couple of
deals with the other prisoners to help him out. So
at the beginning of July, Gunta decided it was finally
time for escape number four.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (31:48):
Thank you. Ben had to get that fourth one, Yeah,
you gotta get it. So step one, he says, he
prepared for the journey ahead by eating several substantial buttered rolls.
If you were going to go run for freedom, what
would you want to see your last meal?
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Billy hell done us? Hell done us.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
It's a meal my grandmam eggs Lithuanian dish. It's basically
similar to perogi. Oh, but it's like a dough and
meat things. It's one of my favorite things. It's a
fantastic what's your last meal?
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Oh man? Probably fun, do you know, really? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Cheese or chocolate?
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Cheese and chocolate. I'm just gonna like have if I
can double dip, you know, I'll just be like because
I like the I'm like, if I'm gonna go out,
I'm gonna go out with like the I love the
custom of it, you know, pulling out a little bread,
pulling out the thing. I was just a classic guy.
What do you want me to tell you? And I
was like, So that night, during the evening roll call,
another prisoner laid in. Gunter sped and claimed to be
(32:41):
sick while Guntra and another German officer slipped over the
barbed wire fence under the cover of storm. They had
three rows of electrified barbed wire to cross right, but
Gunter and his companion had bundled themselves in thick leather
and they were able to scramble up and over, taking
a few scratches, but nothing worse. Gunter does say at
one point he tore a hole in the seat of
(33:01):
his trousers. How did they How did they even get
the thick leather leggings to you? Said, I don't fucking
want to know. So once they were on the road,
they had a close call as one of the prison
guards passed by Goldjer says that the two escapees behaved
like a rollicking pair of love birds and locked together
in a kiss, and they just heard that the guard
clicked his tongue and he went on by I love
(33:23):
the idea of Gonta taking it on for like longer
than necessary, because just because he was lonely, like bro, like, bro,
we been kissing for a while, Like you're sure he
can still see us, like yeah, yeah, Now tell me
I'm funny, I'm cute, loud, not tell me I'm beautiful. Please.
So Gujar had carried some normal clothes with him, along
with a razor and a few other things. So the
next morning, as the two escapees made their way toward
(33:45):
the nearest train station, they shaved, they changed clothes, and
climbed onto the train as normal passengers. They easily reached
London by noon and escaped Number four was complete. Gunder
knew the city he had visited before the war, and
he made his fine costume change into a dirty sailor
suit apparently, and he started looking around the docks for
a boat he could steal. It actually took him a
(34:07):
couple of weeks because in the meantime, Gonter says He
made sure to have a good time in London, right,
He went to the museums, eight in the pubs, and
he even saw at least one play. What would be
a show? Yea, He's like, I kind of get it off.
What would be one show that you risk your freedom
to go see your concert?
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I wish I got to see Yeah right before the pandemic.
I was going to see a rage against the machine.
They had just got back together. I would love to
see them live.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
Yeah. For me would be a Menuda reunion. I just
got to see him once. I talk about him all
the time.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
So might Minuda was different from Amenudo, didn't I?
Speaker 1 (34:44):
There you go your Spanish lie, you're du a linguist popping.
But all the fun and games had come to an end.
Gunta saw in the paper and that the other escapee
had been caught, and then the bricks were hot on
his trail. The police were searching for a man with
a large dragon tattoo on his left arm. So the
Dragonmaster finally had to go ahead and just start stealing
some fucking boats.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
Oh, I don't I thought you were going to say,
cut off his arm.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
He cut off it. I love it. I loved him
being like I knew I shouldn't have made people call
me dragon Master here too, like why did I do this?
I couldn't get enough of this nickname. So the first
boat that Gunter stole was about as successful as his
flying right. He climbed inside a little boat and pushed
off the dog bor. After a minute, he realized that
the boat was leaking, and he says that he tried
to paddle the Thames River exactly while it was going dry.
(35:31):
So by the end the river was empty and the
boat was full and he was completely stuck in the mud. Wow.
He says that he crawled through the mud back through
the river bank, where people walking by thought he was
drunk and just laughed at him for crawling around in
the mud. Seriously, has there ever been a more like
go home your drunk prison escape like book? Dude, like
fucking cash it in? But Gunja went down the river
(35:51):
and so the next night, as the tide was going out,
he found an unattended fishing boat, so he pushed out
into the English Channel. It was under the cover of
darkness he was able to paddle furiously toward a streamer
that was anchored off the coast. He reached it without
being seen, climbed aboard and stowed away, That is, escaped.
Number five, Gunter was finally on his way one bar
(36:15):
back to Germany. Gunto Pluscha, was the only German prisoner
to escape an English prisoner of war camp in either
World War One or World War Two, or at least
that's a story. So in total, his journey from Sintau
across America, into the English pow camps, and then finally
back into Germany had taken only nine months. In nineteen
(36:37):
twenty two, Yeah, Gunter published a book in English called
My Escape from Dunnington Hall, and it gave a detailed
story of his life. It is you might not be
surprised to hear extremely racist about people he met in China,
and this is so I want to recommend people reading it.
But he spends a lot of time talking about how
great Germany is and how how much he loves German
(36:57):
Emperor and the prestige of the white race. Oh that's nice,
Oh that's so good for you, gunt. There's a lot
of extravotion about like darling blonde hair and wonderful blue
eyes and wait a minute, was he describing you Billy
He's like, one day there was a born a man
who builds houses with beautiful blue eyes. I don't even
know are your eyes blue or green?
Speaker 6 (37:16):
They're blue. Guncher's my uncle. After his escape, Gunte took
up flying again. When the war ended, he started sailing too.
He started going to his favorite German destination, Argentina. Bro
German soldiers love Argentina like they love It's wild.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
It's wild how many blond babies were born in nineteen
forty six down there? You know. Obviously guy was truly
a trailerbilizer for Nazis. You know. On one of his trip,
Gunter even brought a camera with him and made a
silent film called in Wilde Fluges zu unzbucken Belton, Oh
sorry Germans or flying in Pictures to Unknown Worlds.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
No I thought it translated to one percent that bitch.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
That's what it is. It was a Lisso song, an
early version of a Lisso song. So it follows his
journey Coloss the Atlantic, showing him flying and has some
early airborne footage of Tierra al Felo. It's all up
on YouTube at this point if you want to check
it out. And apparently it was a huge hit in
Germany in the nineteen thirties. So all these things bring
us to the end of his life and he guesses
for how Guntar is going to die? Dduh.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
It costs like chokes on something in sleep.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
No no, no, no no. He was flying. He was
flying his plane on Argandina, of course, and once he
was up over the mountains, he lost control for what
felt like the million times. But the self proclaimed Dragonmaster
had run out of luck. It was nineteen thirty one
when Gunta finally went down in the mountains of Patagonia.
Only this time, instead of the plane flying into a
(38:44):
pile of shit, it was a pile of shit flying
into a mountain. Oh and that's it, buddy. Wow, What
are the takeaways? What are the takeaways of this story?
For you, my friend?
Speaker 3 (39:04):
To get out of any situation you need just some
careen love.
Speaker 1 (39:08):
That's it, man. And so now let me do a
little plug. Okay, So listeners can find you in the
film Lift on Netflix, Roadhouse on Amazon, the franchise on HBO,
and later this year, Leelo and Stitch live action remake Roadhouse,
Roadhouse Baby. Check it out Roadhouse, And so listen, let
me know if you're into this, but to play us out.
I would like for them to play as a song
(39:28):
and for us to kind of try to reenact a conversation,
a conversation or a song, because I hear you have
a beautiful voice, So a song would go between Gunter
and maybe his military observer up in the air for
the first time. You want to try it? Okay, give
us some music. Do you see a mountain down there?
(39:51):
Should we go down there?
Speaker 4 (39:53):
Is it destiny that Wi Kings is really cold in
the back seat?
Speaker 2 (39:58):
Can you open stuff window?
Speaker 1 (40:00):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (40:00):
They're on the windows because there is the open air cockpit.
Speaker 1 (40:03):
Yeah, I got na cross, I got that crusters you
want to crush? You want to custer? You see that?
Would you like to go? Man? God, thank you Bailey,
Thank you so much. Brother. That was so fucking funny.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
Do some amazing shit.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Man, brother, I have all the love for you. I
appreciate you doing this, Thank you for being so open
with us. And I can't wait for us to do
another fucking film together. Man, I really truly can't wait. Ah. Yeah, anytime,
all right, brother, thank you? And that's great. As escapes,
We're out. Gradi'st Escapes is a production of iHeart Radio
(40:41):
and Film Nation Entertainment in association with Gilded Audio. Our
executive producers for me are Turo Castro, Alyssa Martino and
Milan Papelka from Film Nation Entertainment, Andrew Chug and Winning
Donaldson from Gilded Audio, and Dylan Fagan from iHeartRadio. The
show was produced and edited by Carl Nellis and Ben Chugg,
who are also, respectively, our research overlord and music overlord.
(41:01):
Our associate producer is Tory Smith, who's our other overlord.
Nick Dooley is our technical director. Additional editing by Whitney Donaldson.
Special thanks to Alison Cohen, Dan Welsh, Ben Riiseek, Sarah Joyner,
Nicky Stein, Olivia Canny and Kelsey Albright. Hey, thank you
(41:30):
so much for listening, and if you're enjoying the show,
please drop a rating or review. My mom will call
you each personally and thank you, and we'll see you
all next week.
Host
Arturo Castro
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