December 1, 2021 • 12 mins
In the 1950s a group dedicated to clothing animals out of a sense or morality gained momentum. “A nude horse is a rude horse!” was their battle cry.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, welcome to short stuff. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck
and this is short stuff. And as I say, sometimes
getty up, but in this case it'd be getty up,
you horse with pants on that was smooth as sandpaper.
Oh that hurts, Chuck. Uh, this is pretty good. You
(00:24):
dug this one up. The Society for indecent indecency to
naked animals, that's right, which is kind of which is
kind of like the the finest example of the the
stodgy kind of morality. Um that that was characteristic of
(00:46):
the nineteen fifties. Like, this is the apex of that.
That's right. It was a group of people that got
together and said, you know what, we can't have anymore
in our society. Are these naked animals walking around in
their disgusting parts. We need to put clothing on animals
on anything over four inches tall or six inches long.
(01:08):
Our children are at steak. Get the clothed. Yes, they
were offended by naked animals, this group, and they wanted
to clothe animals. That was their purpose, that was their drive.
And at first it was a very little known group.
But then in May of nineteen nine, the president of
Sina ge Clifford Pruite, Jr. Uh appeared on the Today
(01:32):
Show and basically explaining what SINA was all about and
calling for all animals to be clothed um and he
said a lot of weird things, not just in this interview,
but in multiple interviews that came over the following years,
where he said things like um zoos were peep shows
(01:52):
for kids. One of his favorite phrases was a nude
horse is a rude horse, m hmm. And basically called
for support and membership. And after that Today Show appearance
in nineteen nine, membership swelled like almost overnight. Yes, believe
it or not, there were more than fifty thousand people
(02:15):
in the United States. They said, I agree, we need
to get clothing on all animals. Here's some money. I
was a woman in Santa Barbara, California. You sent a
forty thousand dollar check in nine in the nineteen fifties.
This was about three fifty dollars today to help fund
clothing for animals. And they basically said, all right, get involved.
(02:35):
To get your community involved issue UH sign us sub
summons is to your neighbors, if you see them walking
their dog without pants on, you need to give them
a summons, They picketed the White House. They sent letters
to President Kennedy that said, you need to get pants
on your horses, sir, cover private parts. Yeah, cover those
(02:57):
horse penises. And it was kind of see that one.
Yeah have you seen? Have you seen? Um? What's it called?
I think you should leave? What is that? How do
I know that? I can't remember? The guy's name is hilarious.
He's like best friends with Andy Samberg's Tim something sounds
(03:18):
really familiar. Anyway, It's on Netflix and they have this
one kind of fake ad and it was for a
ranch um where they bred horses to have very very
small penises so that men don't have to be ashamed
of their own penis size when they ride these horses
around this dude ranch. Oh and that that guy Tim Robinson. Yes, yes,
(03:38):
because I have not seen that though. It's wonderful. Uh,
but I am seeing now that Adie Bryant's husband, Connor
O'Malley is on their Connor Listen to Stuff you Should
Know at one point, and he is one of the
great weirdo comedians ever. Yeah, it's like a magnet for
weirdo comedians. This year was Uh, that's pretty funny. So
Americans are getting involved, like I said, they're petitioning the
(03:59):
president there uh um picketting the White House, and then
it culminates in eighteen I'm sorry, in nineteen sixty two. Uh,
it feels like it should be eighteen sixty two when
ge Clifford Prut appears with none other than Walter Cronkite,
most trusted news person in the country, and he was
(04:20):
interviewed on CBS News Prime Time. He sang the Sena's
anthem called Wings of Decency with a ukulele, and it
was a very very big deal and sort of the
apex of this movement. Can we sing the wings of decency?
Um sign an anthem? You can high on the wings
of sign Uh we fight for the future. Now let's
(04:44):
close every pet and and um mole weather, dog, cat,
horse or cow. Ge Clifford Prue our president. He works
for you and me, so clothed all your pets in
joined the march for worldwide decency. So he's playing this
anna ukulele on uh CBS News with Walter Cronkite interviewing him.
(05:10):
Ge Clifford Prout Jr. Is the president of SIGNA and
there's a There's a guy who is operating the camera
for CBS News that says, hey, wait a minute, that
guy looks awfully familiar, doesn't n Chuck, that's right, and
perhaps here's where we should take our break. Right, that's right, agreed.
If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just
(05:32):
listen to Chuck. Alright, we're back. Cameraman at CBS News
(05:58):
sits up and says, wait a minute, I recognized that guy,
and what did he say? He said, that's no g
Clifford Prute. That man's name is Buck Henry and in
the future he's going to be a very famous screenwriter
and actor for comedy. That's right. There was no g
Clifford Prute. There was no Society for Indecency to Naked
(06:19):
Animals tally Well, technically there was, but it was just
a big put on. It was just a big joke. Yeah,
there's a guy named Alan Abel who would go on
to become one of America's most famous and prolific and
successful hoaxters. And I think like he's got half a
dozen short stuffs coming down the pike himself. He was
(06:41):
just that prolific. But this was the first time America
was introduced to alan Abel, and they had been had
that for four years. I saw in some places six years.
Buck Henry kept up this this ruse at the behest
of alan Abel and went on Cronkite, went on The
Today Show, went on tons of national interview shows, and
(07:02):
earnestly professed a need for animals to be clothed. So
he must not have been known by face at all
at that point. Hard but Henry, Yeah, no, his crew
is just starting out. It's astounding that he was ever
recognized at all. And even when he was, it was
a good three years into the hoax to that cameraman.
(07:23):
Cameraman was deep on the independent comedy circuit. I think exactly.
That's how I take it. That's pretty great. So, yeah,
it was all a hoax, um he you know, And
as is many times with hoaxes like this, there is
a a statement being made. And the statement here was
Able was really turned off by the moral, uh the
(07:44):
moral majority of the United States in the nineteen fifties,
and how put off they would be about everything. And
he said, maybe a good way to to take the
the p out of this thing would would be two
become one of them. And he said he's been hired
by uh. Something he saw in Texas in the nineteen fifties.
He was driving on a highway and saw like traffic
(08:06):
was stopped and everyone was kind of standing around. And
when he got out, he saw that traffic had stopped
because two cows were having sex in the middle of
the highway. And he said he he just saw the
looks on these piece faces, at these people's faces. Some
of them were clearly disgusted. Some of them wouldn't couldn't
even bear to look at it and cover their eyes.
One woman was angry, and he he was just like,
(08:28):
what is going on? These cows? They don't know morality,
They're just doing what cows do. And these Americans are
so stuffy that they're literally upset about this, right, they're
offended by this. It's yeah. So he at first tried
out some low hanging fruit and he um wrote a
letter to the editor of the Saturday Evening Post, um,
(08:51):
you know, professing for the first time signa and the
it's it's goals and aims as a joke um And
he got a rejection like her, but the tone of
the rejection letter kind of spurred him to keep going.
The editor you know, wrote indignantly that he really disagreed
with this and he thought it was a terrible idea.
(09:11):
And Um alan Able realized that this guy had had
failed to take it as a joke that he thought
was really and he's like, well, who else can I fool?
Let's see where else we can take this. And he
went to his friend Buck Henry and said, hey, no
one knows what you look like yet or who you are.
Will you pose as G. Clifford Prute, the president of Sina?
And this was right up Buck Henry's alley. He said,
(09:32):
oh yeah. And they kept this up for four to
six years, Chuck, not secretly, not quietly, as loudly and
nationally as they possibly could. They kept this hoax going. Yeah,
I get the feeling this was had more legs than
he ever dreamed it would. Yes, and just decided, as
any great um sort of Andy Kaufman like comedian like,
(09:55):
to keep rolling with it once once it's going, if
everyone is fooled. And even after it was exposed in
nineteen sixty four by Time magazine, UM, people like Walter
Cronkite was still really mad. He felt he had been
made a full of obviously Uh, it's important to point
out that he did not take any of this money.
He wasn't drifting people, So that forty grand that check
(10:16):
was never cashed or anything. Yeah, that's yeah, Like people
would be angry. There's listeners right now, they're like, wait
a minute, this guy stole all this money, right, and
he was a comedian, right, So that never happened, thankfully,
no hum. But the thing that was most astounding was
that they accidentally inadvertently created a moral movement to clothe animals.
(10:38):
Those fifty thousand people that joined SINA were earnest, like,
they were passionately supportive of clothing animals because it was
indecent to have naked animals running around. A joke became reality,
and that is about the best you could possibly hope
for from a hoax. That's a cultural criticism. Yeah, I'm
(10:58):
not a big fan of clothing on animals at all.
I'm not either lead the animals alone everybody, Like if
if your dog needs a sweater in the winter or something,
that's okay to me. But like these people that dress
up their animals and take pictures of I don't know,
I feel it's not very respectful. Oh I see what
you mean. Yeah, we dressed moment, but it's just for warmth. Yeah,
(11:19):
then that's different if, like I said, if your dog
needs a sweater or a thunderbuddy, which is what we
called the thundercoats the vests. What about ThunderCats, I don't
know anything about ThunderCats. You don't know the ThunderCats that
cartoon from the eighties. I've heard of it, but it
was a little after my time. Oh I could see that,
but it was directly in my wheelhouse. And that is
(11:42):
one of the all time greats. All right. Uh So, obviously,
since we started talking about ThunderCats, that signals that this
episode of short Stuff is over right, that's right. Before
we go, Chuck, I want to say thank you very
much as Zachary Crockett and Priceonomics, the Museum of Hoaxes
and Ripley's believe it or not, believe it or not
for being sources about this. So keep an ear out
(12:04):
for alan Able short Stuffs in the future, because he's
got plenty more coming. In the meantime, everybody, short Stuff
is out. Stuff you should Know is a production of
I Heart Radio. For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit
the iHeart radio, app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows. H
Hey, welcome to short stuff. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck
and this is short stuff. And as I say, sometimes
getty up, but in this case it'd be getty up,
you horse with pants on that was smooth as sandpaper.
Oh that hurts, Chuck. Uh, this is pretty good. You
(00:24):
dug this one up. The Society for indecent indecency to
naked animals, that's right, which is kind of which is
kind of like the the finest example of the the
stodgy kind of morality. Um that that was characteristic of
(00:46):
the nineteen fifties. Like, this is the apex of that.
That's right. It was a group of people that got
together and said, you know what, we can't have anymore
in our society. Are these naked animals walking around in
their disgusting parts. We need to put clothing on animals
on anything over four inches tall or six inches long.
(01:08):
Our children are at steak. Get the clothed. Yes, they
were offended by naked animals, this group, and they wanted
to clothe animals. That was their purpose, that was their drive.
And at first it was a very little known group.
But then in May of nineteen nine, the president of
Sina ge Clifford Pruite, Jr. Uh appeared on the Today
(01:32):
Show and basically explaining what SINA was all about and
calling for all animals to be clothed um and he
said a lot of weird things, not just in this interview,
but in multiple interviews that came over the following years,
where he said things like um zoos were peep shows
(01:52):
for kids. One of his favorite phrases was a nude
horse is a rude horse, m hmm. And basically called
for support and membership. And after that Today Show appearance
in nineteen nine, membership swelled like almost overnight. Yes, believe
it or not, there were more than fifty thousand people
(02:15):
in the United States. They said, I agree, we need
to get clothing on all animals. Here's some money. I
was a woman in Santa Barbara, California. You sent a
forty thousand dollar check in nine in the nineteen fifties.
This was about three fifty dollars today to help fund
clothing for animals. And they basically said, all right, get involved.
(02:35):
To get your community involved issue UH sign us sub
summons is to your neighbors, if you see them walking
their dog without pants on, you need to give them
a summons, They picketed the White House. They sent letters
to President Kennedy that said, you need to get pants
on your horses, sir, cover private parts. Yeah, cover those
(02:57):
horse penises. And it was kind of see that one.
Yeah have you seen? Have you seen? Um? What's it called?
I think you should leave? What is that? How do
I know that? I can't remember? The guy's name is hilarious.
He's like best friends with Andy Samberg's Tim something sounds
(03:18):
really familiar. Anyway, It's on Netflix and they have this
one kind of fake ad and it was for a
ranch um where they bred horses to have very very
small penises so that men don't have to be ashamed
of their own penis size when they ride these horses
around this dude ranch. Oh and that that guy Tim Robinson. Yes, yes,
(03:38):
because I have not seen that though. It's wonderful. Uh,
but I am seeing now that Adie Bryant's husband, Connor
O'Malley is on their Connor Listen to Stuff you Should
Know at one point, and he is one of the
great weirdo comedians ever. Yeah, it's like a magnet for
weirdo comedians. This year was Uh, that's pretty funny. So
Americans are getting involved, like I said, they're petitioning the
(03:59):
president there uh um picketting the White House, and then
it culminates in eighteen I'm sorry, in nineteen sixty two. Uh,
it feels like it should be eighteen sixty two when
ge Clifford Prut appears with none other than Walter Cronkite,
most trusted news person in the country, and he was
(04:20):
interviewed on CBS News Prime Time. He sang the Sena's
anthem called Wings of Decency with a ukulele, and it
was a very very big deal and sort of the
apex of this movement. Can we sing the wings of decency?
Um sign an anthem? You can high on the wings
of sign Uh we fight for the future. Now let's
(04:44):
close every pet and and um mole weather, dog, cat,
horse or cow. Ge Clifford Prue our president. He works
for you and me, so clothed all your pets in
joined the march for worldwide decency. So he's playing this
anna ukulele on uh CBS News with Walter Cronkite interviewing him.
(05:10):
Ge Clifford Prout Jr. Is the president of SIGNA and
there's a There's a guy who is operating the camera
for CBS News that says, hey, wait a minute, that
guy looks awfully familiar, doesn't n Chuck, that's right, and
perhaps here's where we should take our break. Right, that's right, agreed.
If you want to know, then you're in luck. Just
(05:32):
listen to Chuck. Alright, we're back. Cameraman at CBS News
(05:58):
sits up and says, wait a minute, I recognized that guy,
and what did he say? He said, that's no g
Clifford Prute. That man's name is Buck Henry and in
the future he's going to be a very famous screenwriter
and actor for comedy. That's right. There was no g
Clifford Prute. There was no Society for Indecency to Naked
(06:19):
Animals tally Well, technically there was, but it was just
a big put on. It was just a big joke. Yeah,
there's a guy named Alan Abel who would go on
to become one of America's most famous and prolific and
successful hoaxters. And I think like he's got half a
dozen short stuffs coming down the pike himself. He was
(06:41):
just that prolific. But this was the first time America
was introduced to alan Abel, and they had been had
that for four years. I saw in some places six years.
Buck Henry kept up this this ruse at the behest
of alan Abel and went on Cronkite, went on The
Today Show, went on tons of national interview shows, and
(07:02):
earnestly professed a need for animals to be clothed. So
he must not have been known by face at all
at that point. Hard but Henry, Yeah, no, his crew
is just starting out. It's astounding that he was ever
recognized at all. And even when he was, it was
a good three years into the hoax to that cameraman.
(07:23):
Cameraman was deep on the independent comedy circuit. I think exactly.
That's how I take it. That's pretty great. So, yeah,
it was all a hoax, um he you know, And
as is many times with hoaxes like this, there is
a a statement being made. And the statement here was
Able was really turned off by the moral, uh the
(07:44):
moral majority of the United States in the nineteen fifties,
and how put off they would be about everything. And
he said, maybe a good way to to take the
the p out of this thing would would be two
become one of them. And he said he's been hired
by uh. Something he saw in Texas in the nineteen fifties.
He was driving on a highway and saw like traffic
(08:06):
was stopped and everyone was kind of standing around. And
when he got out, he saw that traffic had stopped
because two cows were having sex in the middle of
the highway. And he said he he just saw the
looks on these piece faces, at these people's faces. Some
of them were clearly disgusted. Some of them wouldn't couldn't
even bear to look at it and cover their eyes.
One woman was angry, and he he was just like,
(08:28):
what is going on? These cows? They don't know morality,
They're just doing what cows do. And these Americans are
so stuffy that they're literally upset about this, right, they're
offended by this. It's yeah. So he at first tried
out some low hanging fruit and he um wrote a
letter to the editor of the Saturday Evening Post, um,
(08:51):
you know, professing for the first time signa and the
it's it's goals and aims as a joke um And
he got a rejection like her, but the tone of
the rejection letter kind of spurred him to keep going.
The editor you know, wrote indignantly that he really disagreed
with this and he thought it was a terrible idea.
(09:11):
And Um alan Able realized that this guy had had
failed to take it as a joke that he thought
was really and he's like, well, who else can I fool?
Let's see where else we can take this. And he
went to his friend Buck Henry and said, hey, no
one knows what you look like yet or who you are.
Will you pose as G. Clifford Prute, the president of Sina?
And this was right up Buck Henry's alley. He said,
(09:32):
oh yeah. And they kept this up for four to
six years, Chuck, not secretly, not quietly, as loudly and
nationally as they possibly could. They kept this hoax going. Yeah,
I get the feeling this was had more legs than
he ever dreamed it would. Yes, and just decided, as
any great um sort of Andy Kaufman like comedian like,
(09:55):
to keep rolling with it once once it's going, if
everyone is fooled. And even after it was exposed in
nineteen sixty four by Time magazine, UM, people like Walter
Cronkite was still really mad. He felt he had been
made a full of obviously Uh, it's important to point
out that he did not take any of this money.
He wasn't drifting people, So that forty grand that check
(10:16):
was never cashed or anything. Yeah, that's yeah, Like people
would be angry. There's listeners right now, they're like, wait
a minute, this guy stole all this money, right, and
he was a comedian, right, So that never happened, thankfully,
no hum. But the thing that was most astounding was
that they accidentally inadvertently created a moral movement to clothe animals.
(10:38):
Those fifty thousand people that joined SINA were earnest, like,
they were passionately supportive of clothing animals because it was
indecent to have naked animals running around. A joke became reality,
and that is about the best you could possibly hope
for from a hoax. That's a cultural criticism. Yeah, I'm
(10:58):
not a big fan of clothing on animals at all.
I'm not either lead the animals alone everybody, Like if
if your dog needs a sweater in the winter or something,
that's okay to me. But like these people that dress
up their animals and take pictures of I don't know,
I feel it's not very respectful. Oh I see what
you mean. Yeah, we dressed moment, but it's just for warmth. Yeah,
(11:19):
then that's different if, like I said, if your dog
needs a sweater or a thunderbuddy, which is what we
called the thundercoats the vests. What about ThunderCats, I don't
know anything about ThunderCats. You don't know the ThunderCats that
cartoon from the eighties. I've heard of it, but it
was a little after my time. Oh I could see that,
but it was directly in my wheelhouse. And that is
(11:42):
one of the all time greats. All right. Uh So, obviously,
since we started talking about ThunderCats, that signals that this
episode of short Stuff is over right, that's right. Before
we go, Chuck, I want to say thank you very
much as Zachary Crockett and Priceonomics, the Museum of Hoaxes
and Ripley's believe it or not, believe it or not
for being sources about this. So keep an ear out
(12:04):
for alan Able short Stuffs in the future, because he's
got plenty more coming. In the meantime, everybody, short Stuff
is out. Stuff you should Know is a production of
I Heart Radio. For more podcasts my Heart Radio, visit
the iHeart radio, app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows. H