October 10, 2024 • 57 mins
Can frequent handwashing really keep you from getting sick, or is it just one of those life ironies? As I steer the Nailing History Podcast solo while my co-host John battles an illness, this conundrum seems all too real. Join me as I ponder the environmental impact of political campaign mail and pitch a quirky idea for eco-friendly election materials that could transform the way we think about campaign season.
Venture back to the 19th century with us as we uncover the life of one of San Francisco's most fascinating figures, Emperor Norton I. Despite his whimsical self-declared rule, his visionary ideas—like the League of Nations and the Bay Bridge—reveal a surprisingly progressive mind. Emperor Norton's story is one of imagination embraced by a community, teasing out questions about what true leadership might look like and challenging the conventional understanding of the American Dream.
Just when you think the episode is wrapping up, John makes a surprise cameo, adding his own flair to our discussion on Emperor Norton's enduring impact. We muse over his eccentric proposals and the fictional friendships he might have imagined with historical figures like Queen Victoria. As Halloween draws near, don't just settle for a run-of-the-mill costume—why not channel the spirit of Emperor Norton and inspire a conversation on this iconic character from history? Stay curious, and keep the conversation going with us on social media or through email. We can't wait to bring more captivating stories your way next time!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
all right, everybody, welcome back to another episode
of the Nailing History Podcast.
I'm your host, matt, half ofthe hosting team of this podcast
.
I'm here by myself.
(00:39):
John's not here.
He is busy or not necessarilybusy.
Our schedules have just been.
It's been hard to get ourschedules together and I was
looking at my credit cardstatement and I realized that I
paid $40-some for hosting thispodcast for an entire month
(01:04):
where I think maybe we did oneepisode in the last billing
cycle, maybe.
If not, it was zero.
So I said to myself I got toget this thing back up and going
and I know you guys are waitingon pins and needles waiting for
(01:25):
another episode, wonderingwhere we are.
So I figured I'll give it ashot.
I'll give doing this solo thinganother shot.
John will be on sooner thanlater.
Currently he is sick with thereason that he's not sitting on
the podcast today.
Is he's sick with what may beallergies?
(01:45):
At least they started off asallergies from what he said, and
I don't know.
I just find that funny.
He's the type of person whowashes his hands after every
single thing that he doesTouches the door handle, washes
his hands, blows his nose,washes his hands, falls on the
(02:06):
ground washes his hands.
He's just a washing hands guy.
He carries around thatsanitizer and he's just
constantly washing his hands andI just feel like people like
that are always the ones who getthe most sick.
I never get sick.
I wash my hands when I need to.
I won't get into details onthat, but I'm definitely not an
over washer.
I think that as long as youkeep yourself relatively clean
(02:30):
and you don't stick your fingersin your mouth constantly, I
think you're okay.
Obviously, there are situationswhere, if you could potentially
get other people sick grabbing acommunity bowl of nuts, peanuts
or I don't know, playingbasketball, slap boxing,
(02:50):
something like that where yourhands are getting either
somewhere near their face ornear something that's going in
their mouth, someone else'smouth yeah, I mean you got to be
extra careful, extra cautious,but every day-to-day basis and I
don't really find myself inthat situation a lot.
So my hand washing, I won't gettoo far into it, but I don't
(03:11):
know.
I've been pretty good.
I've been pretty.
I don't think I've gotten manypeople sick.
I've never heard of anyonesaying like I got sick and I
think it's because you don'twash your hands after every time
you touch a door handle at work, so I don't know.
A little bit of a rant, butyeah.
So John's not feeling well.
We've just been having hejoined the rat race so he's
(03:34):
working the old nine to five,working for the weekend, as they
say.
So I've been trying to figureit out, trying to get it
together.
Our schedule is just havingclass and that's why we haven't
had any episodes lately and yeah.
So I want to just give it ashot, do something solo, see how
it works and just to give youguys an update on where we're at
(03:56):
and then kind of give you guyssome entertainment.
Hopefully I can carry theepisode.
I was just trying to think ofsome things, that Any updates of
anything that's been going on.
The election's coming up andI've just been getting all this
mail, all this election mail,and every time I get it I'm just
(04:20):
thinking you know, why are theydoing this?
Everyone talks about theenvironment and how you need to
preserve the environment, andwe're going on paper straws, no
more plastic bags to the grocerystore, which I'm not going to
say one way or the other.
I feel like it's probably agood thing, it's obviously not a
(04:40):
bad thing to be making thosechanges.
But it's just funny becauseit's like you get these things
in the mail and they're not justlike If I was a politician, say
, maybe if you felt like youneeded to reach out to people
via mail as a politician, maybelooking at somebody at the older
generation, or I mean that'spretty much it.
(05:02):
I mean everywhere else you gotcell phones.
I mean if you don't know whoyou're voting for, or if you're
not willing to go online and tryto learn about the local
candidates for your localelections or anything and I
don't think many people are, tobe honest, I know I'm sure not
(05:22):
If you don't have the effort todo that, I mean getting them in
the mail, you're not going tosit there and look at them,
they're going right in the trashand these aren't like.
It's not even like normal paper.
If I was a politician and I'mtrying to get in everyone's good
graces or whatever, I would atleast do.
Recyclable paper, really lightpaper, maybe paper that you
(05:44):
could use as toilet paper.
You're like, hey, when you readthis use time, maybe not toilet
paper, because your face wouldbe all over it.
Maybe you could use it as scrappaper.
I don't know Something whereyou could reuse it, maybe make a
birdhouse out of it orsomething.
Or it could be like one ofthose Some of that paper that
(06:13):
it's biodegradable and it haswildflower seeds in it and it
degrades over time.
It'll grow wildflowers.
So maybe you could saysomething like oh, my policies
will spread like wildflowers Iguess the phrase is actually
spread like wildfire, but Ithink it works too.
Wildflowers do spread.
So you'd say like oh, mypolicies will spread like
wildflowers.
(06:33):
Or oh, if you vote for me,kindness will spread across the
country like wildflowers,something like that.
And then have a note in theresaying like oh, and, by the way,
when you're finished readingthis, you know, toss it out out
the window and you know it'llgrow these flowers that you'll
probably have to deal with forthe next four years, just like
(06:56):
me.
That's not bad, that's not abad play, kind of tie it in and
it works together.
But no, they send you these.
It's like that real heavy-duty,almost cardboard-like paper or
poster board paper covered inwax.
Just probably the worst for theenvironment.
(07:16):
And it's like this stuff wouldlast.
This paper is going to lastthrough a nuclear holocaust, I
feel like, and they're giving itto everybody.
You can imagine how much ofthis is getting sent out If I'm
getting 20 pieces of it in mymail.
Multiply that by how manypeople, how many residences
there are in the country, and Iassume it's going everywhere.
(07:38):
I mean Pennsylvania.
We're in a little bit of aheavier situation because we got
the Senator race going on, soBob Casey and whoever's running
against him going at it.
Editor's note Senator Bob Casey, the incumbent Senator of
Pennsylvania, is facing off inNovember against Republican
(08:01):
nominee Dave McCormick.
Tight race, apparently.
With this snail mail warfare iswhat I call it, and it's just,
it's kind of annoying.
500 years from now, people willbe digging that stuff out of
the ground saying like what inthe heck is Project 2025?
(08:23):
That's a good one.
Just a random thought.
I don't know what else to dowith all this stuff.
I just throw it away because Idon't actively recycle, which I
probably should, but I don'tknow.
Maybe it doesn't go into thetrash.
(08:44):
It probably does.
I like to think it doesn't.
Maybe it doesn't go into thetrash it probably does.
I like to think it doesn't.
It makes me feel better aboutthrowing everything away.
It's just easier.
I don't know.
I think that's pretty much it.
It's October, fall is startingand you got Halloween coming up.
I was thinking about this.
I haven't done it in a while.
As you get to be as you're akid, you love dressing up.
When you're an adult, there'sall this pressure of trying to
(09:05):
be funny with your costume.
I was never very good at it.
I was wondering.
I was thinking, like, whathistorical figure that we have
done that we've covered on thispodcast?
I would dress up as forHalloween, what I would think
would be funny, and maybe itwould be one of those.
That one assassin, the oneassassin what was that guy's
(09:30):
name?
The guy who assassinated GroverCleveland.
He was kind of the good, good,good toe.
He's the one who wrote a poemor something, and, yeah, he
(09:52):
seemed pretty wild, yeah, guto.
So that would be a good one.
I don't know how I feel likethe statute of being able to
joke around about that may havepassed, but it'd be a little bit
tough to do.
Pull that off tastefully, whichI probably wouldn't do.
So I was thinking about that.
And one thing that John and Ihave been talking about for a
(10:14):
while, a figure in history thatwe've wanted to go over on the
podcast, and I figure maybe nowwouldn't be a bad time to go
over it, because John hasn'treally dove too deep in it.
We went over it and we're aboutto present it, but then plans
fell through or whatever, so weweren't able to do it.
But I thought maybe this wouldbe a pretty good Halloween
(10:36):
costume.
If you guys are still trying todress up as somebody for work,
if you guys have a competitionon the most unique costume, or
if there's a one where there's acostume where, if no one can
guess it, you win a prize, maybethis one would be a good one
(10:58):
and a pretty interestingcharacter in history.
So it's good to start a historylesson for the week, maybe, as
you would call it, trying tocarry this myself.
It's tough.
I don't have anyone to bounceoff any of my jokes to, but not
that much different with theperson I'm telling the jokes to.
It doesn't laugh back at them,so I can at least laugh at
myself and see how it goes.
(11:22):
So yeah, so there was this guy.
He lived in San Francisco inthe mid to late 1800s.
His name is Joshua AbrahamNorton.
A lot of people know him asEmperor Norton.
I and he was the first and onlyemperor of the United States of
(11:44):
America.
He was born in England and hewas raised in South Africa.
I think at one point Englandsent a bunch of their poor
people down to South Africa topopulate that area and protect
them from other colonies inAfrica, protect South Africa
from being invaded or taken overfrom other places.
So they think his family mayhave been sent down to South
(12:06):
Africa, for, for that, I thinkit's around 1820.
Um and and so he lived.
He lived there, um, in SouthAfrica, and then immigrated to
the United States, landed in SanFrancisco in 1849.
And when he gets to SanFrancisco 1849, and he was gets
to San Francisco in 1849, and hewas actually a pretty
(12:27):
successful commodities trader,which is somebody who invests in
physical substances like oil,gold, grains, other crops, so
you can figure the bimetallismdebate that we talked about.
Maybe this person may have hadsomething to say about the
silver or gold standard, I don'tknow, maybe he would have
appreciated that episode morethan other people.
(12:49):
And so, yeah, so he's acommodities trader and a real
estate speculator.
So people say that he got toSan Francisco with $40,000 in
his pocket, which I mean.
Sometimes you hear people say,oh, my grandfather came over
here with a nickel in his pocketand he may turn it into
millions.
But this guy comes over 40,000,40 Gs in his pocket and he
(13:12):
flips that to 250 grand in likethree years, say 1852.
So he's living pretty large in1852.
Pretty much one of thewealthier people of the time
period.
250 grand back then must havebeen a lot of money.
I would guess it's a lot ofmoney now.
So yeah, I would assume it's alot of money.
(13:33):
It was a lot of money.
He was living large and incharge.
But then came 1852.
There was a rice shortage thatwas based because of China.
China had a famine so theybanned the export of rice, so it
(13:54):
caused the price of rice to gofrom $0.04 a pound to $0.36 a
pound.
So Emperor Norton's thinking ohman, all these people I live in
San Francisco Rice-a-roni, theSan Francisco treat Rice must
play a big part of the cultureof San Francisco, I guess.
(14:17):
I guess that's a pretty fairlylarge Asian population.
So maybe that's why, or maybeit was just hey, he saw
potential to make some money,decided to short the market,
potential to make some money,decided to short the market.
Which shorting the market?
I'm not really sure.
I saw the movie the Big Shortabout the housing market, kind
of understand it.
This is a little bit morestraightforward.
He figured there's a ship fromPeru coming full of rice, chock
(14:40):
full of rice, bought the wholeshipload, 200,000 pounds.
He bought that for 25 grand,which is like 12.5 cents a pound
.
You do the math, you flip thatright away, go from 12.5 cents,
sell that for 30 cents.
You're more than doubling yourmoney.
All you got to do is sell200,000 pounds of rice, which I
don't know.
Maybe that would have been easy, I'm not sure.
(15:02):
But unfortunately to him, whathe didn't know was that there
were also going to be morePeruvian ships arriving at the
same time, loaded up with thesame rice.
So much so that the priceactually dropped from $0.36 down
(15:23):
to $0.03 a pound.
That means it was even Afterthis.
It was cheaper than it was tostart.
So he took a bit of a bath onthis and tried to avoid the rice
contract, saying that thedealer misled him about the
quality of the rice, spent twoyears of litigation, went all
(15:48):
the way up to the Supreme Courtof California.
He actually won in the lowercourts, but the Supreme Court
told him uh-uh, you don't win.
And in 1854, he officially lostthe litigation and then by 1856
, he filed for insolvency andthen by 1856, he filed for
(16:08):
insolvency.
So you figure, he goes frombeing really rich to really poor
in a matter of two years.
I guess four years, insolvencyin four years, and that might be
enough to that will makesomeone go postal.
I can only imagine so thingsweren't looking too good for
(16:30):
Edward Norton.
So when things don't look goodfor you, I mean, what is there
to do?
You can either wallow around inyour own defeat and be poor and
live below the quality of life,or you can say, hey, why don't
I just start running the country?
Say that I'm running thecountry, create a job for
yourself.
Say, hey, you know what, I'mgoing to be Emperor of the
(16:52):
United States.
I don't like how things aregoing around here and I'm going
to just declare myself to beEmperor.
And what's anyone going to sayabout it?
It's probably happened before,you think, in the history of the
world.
Somebody just like hey, youknow what?
I'm just going to say that I'mthe leader of something and get
a couple people to bite on it,and hey, next thing, you know,
you're feeling pretty good.
(17:12):
One person I think of maybe.
I mean, I don't know I don'tknow if anyone's read up on l
ron hubbard, the scientologistguy, but it kind of seemed like
that.
He's like, you know, I think hewas from a modest background, I
don't think he was as insolvent, maybe as Mr Norton was here,
but I always just felt like hewas like yeah, you know what?
(17:32):
I'm just gonna start a religion.
You get enough people to follow, get some money, I'll be able
to live pretty good.
So I get the same kind of vibefrom this Mr Norton guy.
And so, yeah, in September 1859, he sends a letter to the San
Francisco Daily Bulletin wherehe basically said I'm
(17:57):
proclaiming myself as theemperor of the country and I'm
ordering all the representativesof the other states of the
Union to come out here tomusical hall on February,
february 1st, and start fixingsome, some of these laws.
Let's start, let's fix thegovernment.
You know, meet me over here and, and you know, we'll get
everything figured out.
(18:17):
No one really listened to thisguy.
Unfortunately, or fortunately,however you may say, and um, or
fortunately, however you may say, and yeah.
So, even though no one listenedto him, he just kept going, he
went through, he kept just hekind of kept making
(18:38):
proclamations, kind of didn'tlet anyone get in his way, and
just I figure it's one of thosethings, fake it till you make it
, I'm just going to keep.
I'm the emperor, no one cantell me otherwise.
Emperor is a pretty high rankof government, I would say.
So I think you figure, just hey, I'm the emperor, I can do what
I want.
He's going to keep going.
So a couple other proclamations.
(18:58):
He made October 12, 1859, hemade October 12, 1859, he
formally abolished the UnitedStates Congress and to the point
where January 1860, so a couplemonths later, he summoned the
US, the army, to depose of theelected officials of US Congress
(19:22):
because they were in violationof the imperial edict by
continuing business as plannedin Congress.
So he basically says I'm anemperor, and because I'm saying
that I'm an emperor, congress isno more.
Dissolve Congress, I'm going totake over now, don't worry
about it, everybody, just comeout to San Francisco, we'll get
(19:44):
this all figured out, we'll begood to go.
And then when everybody ignoredhim and he was all like I guess
he was all upset about that.
A couple months later he saysI'm going to get the army to do
it.
You know these guys are now,think, continuing running
Congress and running thegovernment without me involved.
(20:05):
So I'm going to tell the armyto go arrest them.
I'm wondering if anybodyactually listened to him.
Could you imagine like some guyfrom the army just shows up at
the White House like, hey, I'mhere to arrest you guys?
Emperor Norton from SanFrancisco sent me so he's trying
to fix everything over inCalifornia while things were
(20:26):
going a little haywire over herewith the Civil War.
So I don't know, maybe he hadsomething figured out there.
A couple things he did weren'tactually crazy.
A couple of things he didweren't actually crazy.
A couple of things that he said.
He actually called for thedevelopment of a League of
Nations, similar to what our boyWoodrow Wilson tried to set
(20:46):
forth in the 14 points, althoughsome people maybe present,
company excluded, in other words, a certain person who may not
be present on the podcast thatnormally is may also think that
that is crazy, but that waslisted in Wikipedia as something
that wasn't crazy, so I'm goingto go with it.
(21:07):
He forbade any conflict betweenreligions.
That's pretty good.
And he called for theconstruction of a bridge from
Oakland to San Francisco theonly thing I can think of with
that is maybe he was just sickof the traffic.
He had to get from A to B andhe wasn't getting anywhere, so
he was looking out for the restof the people by trying to get a
(21:28):
bridge built and ultimately itwas built.
San Francisco-Oakland BayBridge was built and since it's
been built there have been a lotof people who have been trying
to get the name of the bridge tobe the Emperor Norton Bridge,
but to no avail.
It's still, I believe, calledthe San Francisco-Oakland Bay
Bridge.
Haven't been across that one,but I guess my guess is it
(21:52):
connects San Francisco withOakland or just goes over what's
called the Oakland Bay.
Haven't been across that one,but I guess my guess is it
connects San Francisco withOakland or just goes over what's
called the Oakland Bay.
I've never been there, so Iassume those are both things.
How he made these proclamationshe would just write letters to
the local newspapers and theywould post them.
It was kind of like a wholething.
They just kind of embraced thisas kind of.
(22:15):
At one point I'm thinking, isthis guy for real?
But then, as I did moreresearch, it was kind of like
the people of San Francisco justkind of embraced this guy,
being kind of a weirdo, but theyliked it, it was entertaining
to them, so they would post allthis stuff and especially the
Oakland Bay Bridge.
I live in the Philadelphia areaand if someone were to post
something anybody was to postsome law to improve the traffic
(22:42):
around here I think that mightget some traction on the local
news maybe now, but in realitythis guy was pretty wild.
He's a pretty crazy guy.
He spent his days, quoteunquote, expecting the streets,
spending time in the parks andlibraries, so basically he was
homeless.
It seems like he was walkingthe streets, inspecting the
(23:03):
streets.
He was commenting on theintegrity of sidewalks and kind
of just trying to be.
I like to think of it as, likeyou know, have you ever called
anybody like, oh, that guy iswalking around, like he's the
mayor of the place.
So I feel like this was like hewas kind of the self-proclaimed
, like he was running the showand everyone was listening to
this guy.
He wore a uniform that wassecond-handed to him by army
(23:25):
officers wore a beaver hat withpeacock or ostrich feathers, a
walking stick and umbrella.
So that's where I'm getting to.
Pretty good costume Wear aCivil War era army uniform with
a beaver hat, some feathers init, boom Easy Halloween costume.
(23:48):
He was arrested in 1867.
And they wanted toinvoluntarily commit him for a
mental disorder.
But all the citizens of SanFrancisco got all upset and he
got released and the policeactually apologized to him for
arresting him and after thisarrest the San Francisco police
officers would salute him in thestreet.
(24:09):
So yeah, I mean, the 1870 USCensus actually listed Norton's
occupation as emperor, which youwould think.
Oh, I guess he was validated.
But it also notes that he'sinsane.
So a little bit of A little up,a little down, but yeah, it was
(24:29):
pretty cool.
He issued his own money with hisname on it.
Some people would accept it.
I think it was more of acharity thing.
You print out your own money.
I think about Parks andRecreation If you ever have seen
that show where John Ralphioand Tom Haverford start their
business Entertainment 720, andput their names on the faces or
(24:53):
in Always Sunny in Philadelphia,when they created Patty's Box
to try to stir up the economy,people accepted it More like a
coupon that you write foryourself.
The notes were between $0.50and $ and 10.
He was in love with queenvictoria of england.
(25:15):
He wrote letters to hersuggesting that they should
marry to strengthen theirnations, but the queen never
responded.
But lucky for me, I have chatgpt um and john's favorite, so
he would be proud of me.
I'll read it to you here.
I'll do my best.
Queen Victoria impression.
Dear Emperor Norton, what asplendid surprise to receive
(25:39):
your proposal.
I must say your offer hasbrought me more joy in a
particularly well-brewed pot oftea, though I fear I have never
been one to say yes to aproposal quite so unexpectedly
as the self-proclaimed emperorof the United States your title
is as unique as your reign and Imust admit it has piqued my
(26:01):
curiosity.
However, marrying a man whorules from afar seems like it
would require a rather extensivetravel budget, not to mention
an arsenal of fancy hats toimpress the diplomatic crowd.
Budget, not to mention anarsenal of fancy hats to impress
the diplomatic crowd.
I can't help but wonder how ourwedding would be received.
A queen and an emperor unite?
Will there be corgis at theceremony, or shall we invite
(26:23):
your collection of extraordinarypigeons instead?
The royal gossip would bepositively delighted, though my
advisors might have a fit.
While I do appreciate yourimaginative spirit and your
dedication to the title you'vebestowed upon yourself, I must
graciously decline your offer.
My responsibilities as queenkeep me quite busy, and it would
(26:44):
be difficult to explain to mysubjects why I'd be spending my
afternoons conferring with anemperor about the best way to
serve scones.
Thank you for your laughter andyour proposal has brought me.
May your reign be filled withwhimsical adventures and a
delightful proclamations.
Yours with the fondest regards.
Victoria R.
Now I don't know.
(27:10):
I don't want to speak forEmperor Norton, but I think if
he would have gotten that as aresponse, he might have gone a
little bit deeper into insanity.
She really put the screws tohim in this letter, even though
it's fictitious.
Maybe that is how she wouldhave said it If she said stuff
about her advisors having a fit.
All you're thinking about isbest ways to serve scones.
(27:33):
Having it fit All you'rethinking about is best ways to
serve scones.
That your proposal made herlaugh.
I mean, those have just beenheartbreaking for him.
So maybe we're lucky that shedidn't respond, because it could
have created quite theinternational stir there.
Also, a bit of an editor's noteas I read through this letter
again, I couldn't help butrealize that some of her excuses
(27:54):
were the travel she didn't havethe budget for travel to visit
with him or she's too busy asthe queen.
There's all these things thatyou know.
You got to give him more creditthan that.
I mean, that's a pretty goodcop-out, pretty realistic way
for someone to avoid juststraight up turning them down,
(28:19):
thinking that you're crazy, likeshe could have just said and I
know this letter is fictitious,but I'm just thinking like she
could have responded back likedude, you're crazy, I'm an
actual queen and I can't be seen, you know, around you.
Maybe that would have been abetter thing than ignoring him,
because then he never had anyonetell him the truth.
(28:39):
They're like dude, you're nuts,and maybe if it would have came
from Queen Victoria, maybe hewould have been able to clean up
his act and pick himself up bythe bootstraps and get his stuff
back in order.
Bootstraps and get his stuffback in order.
(29:01):
So unfortunately he died onJanuary 8th 1880 at the age of
61, 62, 60.
I mean, who really knows?
He collapsed in the street, Iguess, and no one was there to
revive him or anything, and hedied on the sidewalk.
I believe he died in completepoverty.
He had five or six bucks in hispocket and one gold coin that
(29:22):
was worth maybe $2.50 at home,so he's worth eight.
He came to the country.
It's the opposite of theAmerican dream you come to the
country with a nickel in yourpocket, turn into millions.
He came to the country with$40,000 in 1849 and died with
maybe $8.
So not the best, not the best,but hey, you know what Sounds
(29:46):
like he had fun doing it and whoknows how many of his Emperor
Norton bucks he had.
So I guess he was doing okayfor himself.
Emperor Norton Bucks he had, soI guess he was doing okay for
himself.
Also found his house was a faketelegram from the Tsar
Alexander of Russiacongratulating him on his
forthcoming marriage to QueenVictoria.
This guy is living in a fantasyworld, but hey, he was having
(30:16):
fun.
You kind of think about it.
What harm is it If it's realityto you?
Hey, who knows?
So he lived his life thinkinghe was the emperor of the United
States, king of Hawaii, waslike, okay, he had one person
following him.
So, like I said, you only needone.
He had at least one person.
He had the whole city of SanFrancisco, the police saluting
(30:36):
him, the whole city was all overhim.
They all loved him.
The fan favorite.
10,000 people came to hisviewing before his funeral.
I guess you would consider hima folk hero in San Francisco.
I don't know if many people Iwould think maybe people from
San Francisco might know who heis.
Nobody over here does.
I don't know if he's taught inhistory classes now I was just
(31:00):
talking to my nephew today.
He's in 7th grade and he'sstarting to learn American
history.
So I said, oh, that's cool,what are you learning about?
And he said the Ice Age.
I'm like the Ice Age.
How is that that anything?
How does that have to do withamerican history and the ice age
?
I don't know, the ice age wouldbe earth science.
(31:20):
I mean, I guess maybe you needto learn a little bit about the,
the uh, ice age, and I guesshe's talking about the bering
strait, I think, and the bridgethat was Is that what it is?
The bridge that at one pointconnected Russia to Alaska and
that's how the people came overfrom there to populate North
(31:42):
America.
So maybe that's where he'scoming from.
It's a stretch, but yeah, sothey might be too busy teaching
about the Ice Age than EmperorNorton, unfortunately.
They might be too busy teachingabout the ice age than emperor
Norton, unfortunately.
Um, or anybody like this.
But um, pretty fun, I mean I,you know, when I first like kind
of what I, when I first heardabout it, the initial thought
(32:02):
that I have is like this guy wasfor real and he was an actual
political figure and he justdecided to do that.
But as I read more and more, Ikind of I realized that he's
more of some crazy guy roamingthe streets of San Francisco and
the people from San Franciscojust embraced him and looked out
for him, the people whoaccepted his money for food and
(32:24):
restaurants.
They're just like.
I'll give him a break.
I think he's just like a townidiot and I think people just
liked him for it.
He was harmless as long as hewasn't doing any harm, which I
don't think he really did at anypoint and I think people just
liked him for it Harmless aslong as he wasn't doing any harm
, which I don't think he reallydid at any point.
I think he was.
They liked him.
Reminds me of growing up in alocal mall near me.
There was this homeless guy wholived in the mall.
(32:44):
Everybody knew about thishomeless guy and he had this
shanty built in the woods rightacross the street from this mall
and he would walk through themall and I guess when he would
get enough money he would go andget a coffee or anything.
Everyone knew about this guyand he was super homeless but
(33:05):
harmless.
From all reports he was in thenews In the local news.
I remember at one point, I think, they were going to In this
wooded area that he was living.
They were either going todevelop it or the authorities
caught wind of it and they weregoing to force him to move and
everyone was like no, no, no, heshould be able to stay.
(33:26):
He should be able to live in ashanty in the woods near the
mall.
He's not harming anybody, whichis true.
But I the woods near the mall,he's not harming anybody, which
is true.
But I guess now you think aboutit.
Maybe you have a GoFundMeaccount for him.
Maybe get him an apartment orsomething.
Maybe clean him up, get him ajob, I don't know.
But yeah, it kind of remindedme of him.
One of those situations wherewhat's not to like about him?
(33:52):
He's just minding his ownbusiness.
It's pretty wild, but take thebull by the horns.
That's what Emperor Norton did.
Maybe we can all learn a littlebit from him.
You got to feel for him alittle bit.
You know you lose that moneylike that.
You think you're going to bemaking out something good.
Then a couple of Peruvians pullthe wool over your eyes Take 25
(34:12):
G's from you.
They flipped the switch.
He was trying to corner themarket.
And then the Peruvians werelike we got one, we're going to
get one over on you.
Fine, you want to buy this for12 cents a piece?
Sure, go ahead.
We're going to send four moreships full of rice.
So I was wondering, you know, Imean I don't know Rice-a-roni,
the San Francisco treat, Iwonder if there has anything to
(34:34):
do with Emperor Norton.
I feel like national bohemianbeer that's in Maryland.
From what my dad tells me,every can of that had the story
of the Maryland blue crab.
Maybe rice-a-roni, every boxshould have a little story of
Emperor Norton.
Or, hey, anyone trying to getinto the rice business, maybe
(34:56):
you make it Emperor Norton'sRice.
Somebody might buy that.
That'd be kind of cool.
Rest in peace, emperor Norton.
I hope somebody here might wantto dress up for him as
Halloween.
Like I said, just get a CivilWar army uniform, throw a beaver
hat on there and you'd be goodto go One side, one kind of side
(35:19):
interesting thing about him ora little side story In San
Francisco during his reign Iguess you would call it a
20-year reign, basically, if youwant to call it that there were
these two dogs, these famousdogs.
San Francisco seemed to be apretty crazy I guess not much
different than maybe what youwould consider it now, or like
when hippies were there, just amore of a counterculture type
(35:41):
situation, kind of embracing theweird.
Back then stray dogs were areally big problem in the cities
of the United States, to thepoint where, in the 1840s
apparently, in Los Angeles, dogsoutnumbered people two to one,
which is crazy.
(36:02):
They would be poisoned, trapped, killed just trying to get rid
of all these stray dogs.
Peta would have a freaking fitat this point.
But I guess if you figure theseshelters, I mean it's not quite
that, but there's a lot of dogsin these shelters.
So it happens these dogs arekind of all over if you don't
control them.
But anyway, if a dog turned outto be like a good ratter, like
(36:24):
it could kill rats, people wouldmark these dogs as these good
ratters and control the ratproblem.
So it was like they wereearning their keep.
I guess you could say beingable to live out in the being
stray dogs, as long as you cantake care of the rats.
Because I guess there's onething worse than a bunch of
stray dogs, it's a bunch ofdirty rats running around the
(36:46):
city.
So there were these two dogs inSan Francisco.
Their names were Bummer andLazarus, and they were Bummer,
or Bummer was a Newfoundland andLazarus was some unknown breed.
They were like the best rattersin San Francisco.
So they were like these heroes,these hero dogs People love
these dogs and they kind ofteamed up.
(37:07):
They were like boys and theywere just.
They would roam the streets,kill rats, and just, everyone
loved them.
At one point they finished theykilled 85 rats in 20 minutes
apparently, which is that's somegood numbers there.
And it just so happened thataround this time Emperor Norton
was roaming the streets too, andI feel like they're all kindred
(37:30):
spirits and there were reportsthat they were always in the
company of each other and thedogs would walk around with
Emperor Norton.
So it was kind of a team.
And there was this cartoon thatI found online.
I was posted, I guess, in anewspaper, and there was a
cartoon.
It was a cartoon and it was.
(37:50):
The cartoon was Emperor Nortonwas at this table with a spread
of food and he was eating andthe dogs were sitting there like
dogs do, like trying to beg forfood and stuff, and the title
of the cartoon was the threebummers.
So I guess it's.
(38:11):
Not only are these stray dogs abummer, but also this town
idiot who thinks he's theemperor of the United States is
also a bummer, which is a bummer, because that would basically
be calling Norton a sad sack.
Pretty funny, I don't know, Ithought that was funny.
(38:34):
I wanted to add that.
So, emperor Norton, we speakyour name and I think there
should be a movie and peopleshould know about this person.
I think that's pretty much it.
I wanted to send them off.
Send Emperor Norton off with alittle song here, just to pay my
respects to the man.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
All right, here we go .
There's a hero.
If you look inside your heart,you don't have to be afraid of
what you are.
If you reach into your soul andthe sorrow that you know will
(39:45):
melt away.
And then a hero comes along,emperor Norton, with the
(40:09):
strength to carry on.
You cast your fears aside andyou know you can survive.
So when you feel like hope isgone, look inside you and be
strong, and you'll finally seethe truth that a hero lies in
you.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
All right, everybody.
So if you're ever going andcrossing the San
Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge,point your finger up in the sky
for one Emperor Norton, becausewithout him the bridge probably
would have still been built.
But you never know, and that'sit.
That's it for this episode.
(40:45):
I don't know, it's pretty dry,I assume, but I wanted to get it
out there.
Let me see if I can get John onthe phone here.
Hold on, yeah, hey, john, it'smatt.
(41:11):
I got you here on the podcast.
I did an.
I did a solo episode no, no,you didn't yeah you're on the
air, dude.
oh, thanks, I'm happy to be aspecial guest.
Yeah, how you?
How you feeling, feeling so.
So, yeah, any of our fans outthere, I'm getting over a bit of
a.
I don't know.
(41:31):
It might be a sinus infection,a few allergies, a head cold.
I mean just all the above.
You know I just started a newjob in Baltimore, working in the
historic Inner Harbor.
Yeah, it's a bit of anadjustment.
Sorry, fans, I know I've been alittle wayward with you.
Maybe you got something fromthe bay.
(41:54):
The harbor Was part of yourfirst day of the job.
To take a dive in the harbor Inorder for me to meet my
probationary period.
Yes, I must dive in the harborat some point, or just drink a
glass full of the water straightfrom there.
Yes, it'll happen the last dayof my initiation.
(42:18):
It will be sure to happen.
Well, yeah, congratulations.
I kind of went through thewhole You're washing hands that
we were talking about earlierand how that's part of the issue
that you wash your hands toomuch Went over that a little bit
.
But really, what I did, I hopeyou're okay with it.
I know you haven't been, we'vebeen talking about it for a
(42:40):
while, but I just did the oldsummary on our boy, emperor
Norton, solo yeah.
Yeah so you got any finalthoughts, just anything.
I kind of went through thewhole thing.
I read a letter, a response,that A fictitious response from
(43:00):
Queen Victoria to his request tomarry her.
So that'll be fun for you tolisten to.
I figure that just kind ofbringing the spirit of you in
there.
But you got anything to say.
Any thoughts on Emperor Nortonoff the top?
Speaker 2 (43:14):
of your head.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Well, I just wonder if James Buchanan had listened
to any of his advice.
Maybe, I don't know Maybe theCivil War could have been
diverted.
There's kind of talk of whatcould have been.
I think him taking on the ideaof being the protector of Mexico
was a bold step in his platform.
(43:35):
Yeah we didn't get to that point.
We didn't get to there becausethey had that boze.
We didn't get to that point, wedidn't get to there because
they had that bozo.
France invaded Mexico becauseMexico couldn't repay them for
their help in their civil war.
Correct, that's right.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
Yeah so.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
Napoleon III decided to take extra measures.
Decided to take extra measures?
Yeah, so they sent some clownfrom the monarchy over there to
sit there.
Austria-Hungary from.
Maximilian I is who they endedup agreeing to send.
He came from Austria-Hungary.
Yeah, he ended up gettingkilled.
(44:14):
I don't know if we ever talkedabout it.
We might have talked about himon the podcast.
He ended up getting killed justbecause, right, yeah, he kind
of got shafted.
Everyone was like, yeah, we feelbad for him, but like he was
deposed, and they're like, well,we have to kill him, even if he
himself is not a bad guy.
It's like we just we broughtback our republic, like we
deposed the monarchy, we have tokill the guy, like it's just
(44:34):
for show at the very least.
And then, yeah, they had hiscorpse on display and for for
any of our fans, if you justtype in Maximilian into Google
Maximilian I in funeralprocession or whatever, it'll
show pictures of him and he'sjust rotting.
His corpse is just rotting.
Yeah, he's on display in acourt somewhere, yeah, so,
(44:55):
anyway.
So they had Maximilian.
France sent him from Austria,hungary, whatever.
So then I guess the people ofMexico felt as though they
didn't have a protector, orthere was no protector assigned,
like looking out for the peopleof Mexico.
So Emperor Norton took it uponhimself to add that to his
titles.
Correct.
Yeah, I mean the selfless guyall around.
(45:17):
You know he wanted to do areally good thing.
I'm sure you talked about itand I can't look forward to
hearing more about it.
But about the rice, you know hewanted to feed people.
He really wanted it Well.
I think maybe he learned hislesson from trying to take
advantage of people While tryingto corner a market that he
obviously knew nothing aboutyeah, usually never a good.
(45:40):
So it's kind of hard to cornera market in general, but it's
even harder to corner one youliterally know zero about.
But he tried.
He gave it his best shot.
Yeah he was a good guy.
I think he was just Somethinglike that happens, a couple of
Peruvians take advantage of youlike that, and that's enough to
(46:01):
piss off the Pope, and I thinkthat's really what happened to
him.
And he just cracked and thenjust tried to make the most of
it.
Tried to run for governorDidn't work.
Then he just tried to take downthe American government from
the top.
He just went right to the topand that's where I got from.
Yeah, did you mention therestaurant?
There's still a bar named afterhim in San Francisco.
(46:23):
No, no, there's still a barnamed after him.
Yeah, there's still a placenamed after him.
Speaker 2 (46:26):
Well, I was talking about how he had that.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
He had that money and he had the money and some
people would take it, somepeople wouldn't.
I feel like it was just charity.
He was just a charity case andI think people just.
He was just a charity case and Ithink people just kind of like
he was harmless and they let himgo Bit of an eccentric and
that's kind of that's been SanFrancisco's bag for a long time.
(46:51):
Some would say so yeah, he'sdefinitely a man of his time and
place and I think all of us andall of our fans can, uh, we can
say we can wish them the best.
Uh, yeah, I said hey, I toldhim.
If you guys are, I said if youguys ever find yourself driving
over the San Francisco OaklandBay bridge, you know, put a
(47:11):
finger up in the air for EdwardNorton or Emperor Norton,
because Might not have beenbuilt without him and Edward
Norton, and Edward Norton andsome good movies.
Let's see.
Yeah, so, okay.
Yeah.
So, john, the way that I wastying this in because we try to
tie things into current times orwhatever the way that I timed
it in and how I got into thesituation was Halloween's coming
(47:36):
up.
Right, it's October,halloween's coming up.
So I was thinking maybe withyour new job, maybe you have
something like this, maybethere's some competition at work
where you're trying to, youhave to dress up, best costume
wins, most unique costume wins,or something like that.
(47:56):
Maybe you want to teachsomebody something while you're
dressed up.
So I thought Edward, I thoughtEmperor Norton.
I wonder if Edward Norton'snamed after him.
You know what I mean.
I think that's actually thenext logical question to ask,
because you've only said hisname five times.
I did, I did it a couple oftimes and, honestly, when I was
filling out, when I was goingthrough ChatGPT to get that
(48:18):
response from Queen Victoria atfirst, I wrote write a response
to Edward Norton's letter and itcame up and it was like oh,
you're an actor, like what?
But anyway, my thought was Onething that I thought of is, of
all the people that come to yourmind that we've talked about on
the podcast, any historicalfigure.
(48:38):
Who would you want to dress upas for Halloween the most?
Who would you want to dress upas for Halloween the most?
Who would you do?
I mean, the Jack of my heart isTedus Caciusco, of course, of
course, that would be yours, myJack of hearts, whether he was a
(48:58):
diamond or not.
Yes, tedus Caciusco would be mynumber one Halloween choice.
Okay, and yourself.
I had said I forget his firstname, but Gato, gato, gato, gato
, gato.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
Yeah, but it'd be tough to and Sean Garfield.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Yeah, I was wondering , you know, and this will be a
little bit of a repeat for thefans, but I was just kind of
wondering if, um, if, uh, likeyou could do that tastefully, if
, like, the you know statute ofthat being funny has passed yet
or not.
Well, I think, just theshenanigans he pulled after the
(49:43):
fact not the fact that he shot apresident, but how he sang a
song up to the gallows and howhe had that really sweet prayer
that he wrote, just the idea ofgetting a job.
I expected a federal job and anambassadorship in France,
because you know I'm and youknow it's funny, you bring that
(50:05):
up because you know he couldhave just pulled an Emperor
Norton, but he didn't.
He tried to.
Maybe he should have done that.
He should have just said hey,you know what, I'm the
ambassador of France.
Move to France and just say I'mnow.
I wonder if he met emperor nor,and emperor normer says you
want to?
Here's, I got a great idea foryou go to this train station at
(50:26):
this hour, you won't miss.
The president should be there.
Just just talk to him.
Just go talk to him.
And maybe something was lost intranslation.
Yeah, oh, man, but yeah, so,yeah, all right, there you go.
That's, that's john's thing.
And hey, I guess, um, hopefullywe'll give a little bit of a
tease to the next episode.
Um, john and I made anothertrip to philadelphia and we um
(50:51):
did some sightseeing.
I'll just leave it at that.
So you know, I think our nextepisode that we're together,
hopefully john's feeling betterand we can get back to, back to
the old uh, weekly or bi-weekly,you know, you know, hopefully
at least bi-weekly, is itbi-weekly?
Speaker 2 (51:07):
it's bi-weekly, every other week I would like every
week every week.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
Yeah, we're gonna play it by ear.
Fans, look, I miss it.
I feel lousy.
You'll probably hear it in myvoice even coming through the uh
, you know the phone speaker,you know as a guest caller.
But I want to clear.
I want to bring my best.
I want to bring my 100% for youall.
So thank you for being patientwith us.
Thank you to my co-host, matt,for taking the initiative and
(51:35):
deciding to put on a soloepisode without my knowing.
I appreciate the foresight andthe go-getter-ness.
Well, you know like I startedoff, I saw that bill for
$40-some for my Buzzsproutserver and I thought to myself
I'm not getting anything forthat, so I might as well just
(51:56):
put something out there for thefans.
More for me, more for the fans,but also for me.
Well, it, more for the fans,but also for me.
I think it's for us.
We got to start.
We're happy to bring our fansalong with the journey.
We love you guys, but at theend of the day, we love doing
this, we love talking history,we love talking different
perspectives and, yeah, wereally hope you guys stay with
(52:19):
us.
Stick with us.
Maybe we'll do another OJepisode soon and, yeah, we
really hope you guys stay withus.
Stick with us.
Cool, well said, maybe we'll doanother OJ episode soon,
because that seems to be the big.
I was hanging out with Emily Mearlier today and she was asking
when we're going to be ready tohave her back on.
Okay, well, then there you go,fans.
You already know what's comingahead.
Yeah, so all right.
(52:39):
Well, john, I appreciate it.
I'm surprised you answered, butI'm glad you did, because I was
uh, just just, uh, 56 minutesin by myself.
Thank you for deciding.
Have you called anybody?
Any other fan?
Speaker 2 (52:55):
no, no one else would answer.
Speaker 1 (52:56):
Let's be honest, okay .
Well, if I'm being totallyfrank, I matt's calling me at
time of the week, so thephillies were in game two in
their series with the new yorknets.
I thought he was calling to sayhey, did you see that ending?
It was a classic, instantclassic.
And, uh, now I'm a littleshocked that I'm on air now.
You know what?
(53:16):
I for my own history podcast.
I'm not even in the studio, I'mliterally calling in from a
phone.
Well, I'll tell you, I wasrecording this podcast as the
innings 8 and 9 went on, becauseevery time I stopped watching I
(53:36):
took a shower.
The Phillies were down.
I took a shower.
I came out, the Phillies weretied.
I started watching it again.
The Mets got back up ahead.
You took a shower, the Phillieswere down.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
I took a shower.
Speaker 1 (53:45):
I came out, the Phillies were tied.
I started watching it again.
The Mets got back up ahead.
You took another shower.
No, I just said to myself I amnot going to watch the rest of
this game.
I'm a little superstitious likethat.
It sounds to me.
I don't even know how itfinished yet, but it sounds to
me like it was a good call.
I to me like it was a good call.
So I finished.
It was an extraordinary call Iwas getting.
You were wanting the Philliesto pull it out.
(54:06):
Yes, and I was, so I'm happyfor that.
My phone's been getting blownup the whole time.
It did distract me a little bitthrough the episode, but I think
I went through it and yeah, soI'm gonna have to catch up on
that once I get off of here.
But I just wanted to thank Johnfor hopping in and you know, I
(54:26):
just wanted to get this out, seehow it goes.
It's going to be wonderful.
Nothing against you, john, Iwas just.
I was itching and I just I knewyou were feeling bad and I
didn't know if we were going tobe able to get this Edward
Norton, this Emperor Nortonepisode out, and I know't know
if we were going to be able toget this Edward Norton, this
Emperor Norton episode out.
And I know you're antsy to talkabout our trip to Philadelphia,
(54:46):
so I figure you know why don'tI just do this in the meantime,
and then hopefully, when we comeback we'll come out, you know
throwing fists yeah.
Talk.
You know Philly's baseballhistory, something you know.
Maybe, Maybe you know Philly'sbaseball history, something you
know, maybe.
Maybe you know we'll just play.
We'll play it by ear.
So, fans again.
We're always happy to hear yourinput and your suggestions.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Yeah, and you know what fans the text line.
Speaker 1 (55:10):
Yeah, and you know, shoot us a text, and you know
what I was thinking is shoot usa text and let us know a couple
things about Halloween.
You know what's your favoritecostume, what person from
American history that we'vecovered on here, or any history
that you would want to dress up.
as for a costume competition,Choose a text and let us know
(55:31):
and we'll read your answers outloud in the next episode.
And if you do, matt and I willshare with you our new favorite
mustard.
That's the trade-off.
It's a big one, that's a tease.
Our new favorite mustard,that's the trade-off.
Speaker 2 (55:42):
It's a big one.
Speaker 1 (55:42):
That's a tease.
That's a tease, that's a bigold tease for our next episode.
Thanks for hanging with us,matt.
Thanks for giving me a call,thanks for letting me be on the
show.
I didn't feel right not havinga whole episode without you, of
course.
Speaker 2 (55:58):
It didn't feel right.
Speaker 1 (55:59):
I appreciate the call All right, john.
Well, hey, you feel better andwe'll see you on the next one.
All right, sounds good, you gotanything to leave the listeners
.
You know it.
Stay curious, all right, seeyou, john, see you guys.
All right fans.
Well, that was pretty cool.
(56:19):
I didn't think he was actuallygoing to answer, so glad we got
it.
We got a little bit of john inthere, probably the most
exciting part of the podcast.
I think I drug on a little bit,um, talking about emperor
norton, but uh, he was prettybig, he was a pretty, uh,
interesting guy and I think johnpretty got brought a pretty
good perspective to tieeverything in.
So, um, I guess that's it.
(56:42):
We'll see you on the next one,as they say, or hear you on the
next one, hopefully.
Don't forget to follow us onTwitter at at Nailing History.
Shoot us an email atnailinghistorypod at gmailcom or
, as always, hit that link inthe description and send us the
old text message All right guys,have a good one, come on and we
(57:20):
say bye-bye.
Sorry, fans, I messed that up.
all right, everybody, welcome back to another episode
of the Nailing History Podcast.
I'm your host, matt, half ofthe hosting team of this podcast
.
I'm here by myself.
(00:39):
John's not here.
He is busy or not necessarilybusy.
Our schedules have just been.
It's been hard to get ourschedules together and I was
looking at my credit cardstatement and I realized that I
paid $40-some for hosting thispodcast for an entire month
(01:04):
where I think maybe we did oneepisode in the last billing
cycle, maybe.
If not, it was zero.
So I said to myself I got toget this thing back up and going
and I know you guys are waitingon pins and needles waiting for
(01:25):
another episode, wonderingwhere we are.
So I figured I'll give it ashot.
I'll give doing this solo thinganother shot.
John will be on sooner thanlater.
Currently he is sick with thereason that he's not sitting on
the podcast today.
Is he's sick with what may beallergies?
(01:45):
At least they started off asallergies from what he said, and
I don't know.
I just find that funny.
He's the type of person whowashes his hands after every
single thing that he doesTouches the door handle, washes
his hands, blows his nose,washes his hands, falls on the
(02:06):
ground washes his hands.
He's just a washing hands guy.
He carries around thatsanitizer and he's just
constantly washing his hands andI just feel like people like
that are always the ones who getthe most sick.
I never get sick.
I wash my hands when I need to.
I won't get into details onthat, but I'm definitely not an
over washer.
I think that as long as youkeep yourself relatively clean
(02:30):
and you don't stick your fingersin your mouth constantly, I
think you're okay.
Obviously, there are situationswhere, if you could potentially
get other people sick grabbing acommunity bowl of nuts, peanuts
or I don't know, playingbasketball, slap boxing,
(02:50):
something like that where yourhands are getting either
somewhere near their face ornear something that's going in
their mouth, someone else'smouth yeah, I mean you got to be
extra careful, extra cautious,but every day-to-day basis and I
don't really find myself inthat situation a lot.
So my hand washing, I won't gettoo far into it, but I don't
(03:11):
know.
I've been pretty good.
I've been pretty.
I don't think I've gotten manypeople sick.
I've never heard of anyonesaying like I got sick and I
think it's because you don'twash your hands after every time
you touch a door handle at work, so I don't know.
A little bit of a rant, butyeah.
So John's not feeling well.
We've just been having hejoined the rat race so he's
(03:34):
working the old nine to five,working for the weekend, as they
say.
So I've been trying to figureit out, trying to get it
together.
Our schedule is just havingclass and that's why we haven't
had any episodes lately and yeah.
So I want to just give it ashot, do something solo, see how
it works and just to give youguys an update on where we're at
(03:56):
and then kind of give you guyssome entertainment.
Hopefully I can carry theepisode.
I was just trying to think ofsome things, that Any updates of
anything that's been going on.
The election's coming up andI've just been getting all this
mail, all this election mail,and every time I get it I'm just
(04:20):
thinking you know, why are theydoing this?
Everyone talks about theenvironment and how you need to
preserve the environment, andwe're going on paper straws, no
more plastic bags to the grocerystore, which I'm not going to
say one way or the other.
I feel like it's probably agood thing, it's obviously not a
(04:40):
bad thing to be making thosechanges.
But it's just funny becauseit's like you get these things
in the mail and they're not justlike If I was a politician, say
, maybe if you felt like youneeded to reach out to people
via mail as a politician, maybelooking at somebody at the older
generation, or I mean that'spretty much it.
(05:02):
I mean everywhere else you gotcell phones.
I mean if you don't know whoyou're voting for, or if you're
not willing to go online and tryto learn about the local
candidates for your localelections or anything and I
don't think many people are, tobe honest, I know I'm sure not
(05:22):
If you don't have the effort todo that, I mean getting them in
the mail, you're not going tosit there and look at them,
they're going right in the trashand these aren't like.
It's not even like normal paper.
If I was a politician and I'mtrying to get in everyone's good
graces or whatever, I would atleast do.
Recyclable paper, really lightpaper, maybe paper that you
(05:44):
could use as toilet paper.
You're like, hey, when you readthis use time, maybe not toilet
paper, because your face wouldbe all over it.
Maybe you could use it as scrappaper.
I don't know Something whereyou could reuse it, maybe make a
birdhouse out of it orsomething.
Or it could be like one ofthose Some of that paper that
(06:13):
it's biodegradable and it haswildflower seeds in it and it
degrades over time.
It'll grow wildflowers.
So maybe you could saysomething like oh, my policies
will spread like wildflowers Iguess the phrase is actually
spread like wildfire, but Ithink it works too.
Wildflowers do spread.
So you'd say like oh, mypolicies will spread like
wildflowers.
(06:33):
Or oh, if you vote for me,kindness will spread across the
country like wildflowers,something like that.
And then have a note in theresaying like oh, and, by the way,
when you're finished readingthis, you know, toss it out out
the window and you know it'llgrow these flowers that you'll
probably have to deal with forthe next four years, just like
(06:56):
me.
That's not bad, that's not abad play, kind of tie it in and
it works together.
But no, they send you these.
It's like that real heavy-duty,almost cardboard-like paper or
poster board paper covered inwax.
Just probably the worst for theenvironment.
(07:16):
And it's like this stuff wouldlast.
This paper is going to lastthrough a nuclear holocaust, I
feel like, and they're giving itto everybody.
You can imagine how much ofthis is getting sent out If I'm
getting 20 pieces of it in mymail.
Multiply that by how manypeople, how many residences
there are in the country, and Iassume it's going everywhere.
(07:38):
I mean Pennsylvania.
We're in a little bit of aheavier situation because we got
the Senator race going on, soBob Casey and whoever's running
against him going at it.
Editor's note Senator Bob Casey, the incumbent Senator of
Pennsylvania, is facing off inNovember against Republican
(08:01):
nominee Dave McCormick.
Tight race, apparently.
With this snail mail warfare iswhat I call it, and it's just,
it's kind of annoying.
500 years from now, people willbe digging that stuff out of
the ground saying like what inthe heck is Project 2025?
(08:23):
That's a good one.
Just a random thought.
I don't know what else to dowith all this stuff.
I just throw it away because Idon't actively recycle, which I
probably should, but I don'tknow.
Maybe it doesn't go into thetrash.
(08:44):
It probably does.
I like to think it doesn't.
Maybe it doesn't go into thetrash it probably does.
I like to think it doesn't.
It makes me feel better aboutthrowing everything away.
It's just easier.
I don't know.
I think that's pretty much it.
It's October, fall is startingand you got Halloween coming up.
I was thinking about this.
I haven't done it in a while.
As you get to be as you're akid, you love dressing up.
When you're an adult, there'sall this pressure of trying to
(09:05):
be funny with your costume.
I was never very good at it.
I was wondering.
I was thinking, like, whathistorical figure that we have
done that we've covered on thispodcast?
I would dress up as forHalloween, what I would think
would be funny, and maybe itwould be one of those.
That one assassin, the oneassassin what was that guy's
(09:30):
name?
The guy who assassinated GroverCleveland.
He was kind of the good, good,good toe.
He's the one who wrote a poemor something, and, yeah, he
(09:52):
seemed pretty wild, yeah, guto.
So that would be a good one.
I don't know how I feel likethe statute of being able to
joke around about that may havepassed, but it'd be a little bit
tough to do.
Pull that off tastefully, whichI probably wouldn't do.
So I was thinking about that.
And one thing that John and Ihave been talking about for a
(10:14):
while, a figure in history thatwe've wanted to go over on the
podcast, and I figure maybe nowwouldn't be a bad time to go
over it, because John hasn'treally dove too deep in it.
We went over it and we're aboutto present it, but then plans
fell through or whatever, so weweren't able to do it.
But I thought maybe this wouldbe a pretty good Halloween
(10:36):
costume.
If you guys are still trying todress up as somebody for work,
if you guys have a competitionon the most unique costume, or
if there's a one where there's acostume where, if no one can
guess it, you win a prize, maybethis one would be a good one
(10:58):
and a pretty interestingcharacter in history.
So it's good to start a historylesson for the week, maybe, as
you would call it, trying tocarry this myself.
It's tough.
I don't have anyone to bounceoff any of my jokes to, but not
that much different with theperson I'm telling the jokes to.
It doesn't laugh back at them,so I can at least laugh at
myself and see how it goes.
(11:22):
So yeah, so there was this guy.
He lived in San Francisco inthe mid to late 1800s.
His name is Joshua AbrahamNorton.
A lot of people know him asEmperor Norton.
I and he was the first and onlyemperor of the United States of
(11:44):
America.
He was born in England and hewas raised in South Africa.
I think at one point Englandsent a bunch of their poor
people down to South Africa topopulate that area and protect
them from other colonies inAfrica, protect South Africa
from being invaded or taken overfrom other places.
So they think his family mayhave been sent down to South
(12:06):
Africa, for, for that, I thinkit's around 1820.
Um and and so he lived.
He lived there, um, in SouthAfrica, and then immigrated to
the United States, landed in SanFrancisco in 1849.
And when he gets to SanFrancisco 1849, and he was gets
to San Francisco in 1849, and hewas actually a pretty
(12:27):
successful commodities trader,which is somebody who invests in
physical substances like oil,gold, grains, other crops, so
you can figure the bimetallismdebate that we talked about.
Maybe this person may have hadsomething to say about the
silver or gold standard, I don'tknow, maybe he would have
appreciated that episode morethan other people.
(12:49):
And so, yeah, so he's acommodities trader and a real
estate speculator.
So people say that he got toSan Francisco with $40,000 in
his pocket, which I mean.
Sometimes you hear people say,oh, my grandfather came over
here with a nickel in his pocketand he may turn it into
millions.
But this guy comes over 40,000,40 Gs in his pocket and he
(13:12):
flips that to 250 grand in likethree years, say 1852.
So he's living pretty large in1852.
Pretty much one of thewealthier people of the time
period.
250 grand back then must havebeen a lot of money.
I would guess it's a lot ofmoney now.
So yeah, I would assume it's alot of money.
(13:33):
It was a lot of money.
He was living large and incharge.
But then came 1852.
There was a rice shortage thatwas based because of China.
China had a famine so theybanned the export of rice, so it
(13:54):
caused the price of rice to gofrom $0.04 a pound to $0.36 a
pound.
So Emperor Norton's thinking ohman, all these people I live in
San Francisco Rice-a-roni, theSan Francisco treat Rice must
play a big part of the cultureof San Francisco, I guess.
(14:17):
I guess that's a pretty fairlylarge Asian population.
So maybe that's why, or maybeit was just hey, he saw
potential to make some money,decided to short the market,
potential to make some money,decided to short the market.
Which shorting the market?
I'm not really sure.
I saw the movie the Big Shortabout the housing market, kind
of understand it.
This is a little bit morestraightforward.
He figured there's a ship fromPeru coming full of rice, chock
(14:40):
full of rice, bought the wholeshipload, 200,000 pounds.
He bought that for 25 grand,which is like 12.5 cents a pound
.
You do the math, you flip thatright away, go from 12.5 cents,
sell that for 30 cents.
You're more than doubling yourmoney.
All you got to do is sell200,000 pounds of rice, which I
don't know.
Maybe that would have been easy, I'm not sure.
(15:02):
But unfortunately to him, whathe didn't know was that there
were also going to be morePeruvian ships arriving at the
same time, loaded up with thesame rice.
So much so that the priceactually dropped from $0.36 down
(15:23):
to $0.03 a pound.
That means it was even Afterthis.
It was cheaper than it was tostart.
So he took a bit of a bath onthis and tried to avoid the rice
contract, saying that thedealer misled him about the
quality of the rice, spent twoyears of litigation, went all
(15:48):
the way up to the Supreme Courtof California.
He actually won in the lowercourts, but the Supreme Court
told him uh-uh, you don't win.
And in 1854, he officially lostthe litigation and then by 1856
, he filed for insolvency andthen by 1856, he filed for
(16:08):
insolvency.
So you figure, he goes frombeing really rich to really poor
in a matter of two years.
I guess four years, insolvencyin four years, and that might be
enough to that will makesomeone go postal.
I can only imagine so thingsweren't looking too good for
(16:30):
Edward Norton.
So when things don't look goodfor you, I mean, what is there
to do?
You can either wallow around inyour own defeat and be poor and
live below the quality of life,or you can say, hey, why don't
I just start running the country?
Say that I'm running thecountry, create a job for
yourself.
Say, hey, you know what, I'mgoing to be Emperor of the
(16:52):
United States.
I don't like how things aregoing around here and I'm going
to just declare myself to beEmperor.
And what's anyone going to sayabout it?
It's probably happened before,you think, in the history of the
world.
Somebody just like hey, youknow what?
I'm just going to say that I'mthe leader of something and get
a couple people to bite on it,and hey, next thing, you know,
you're feeling pretty good.
(17:12):
One person I think of maybe.
I mean, I don't know I don'tknow if anyone's read up on l
ron hubbard, the scientologistguy, but it kind of seemed like
that.
He's like, you know, I think hewas from a modest background, I
don't think he was as insolvent, maybe as Mr Norton was here,
but I always just felt like hewas like yeah, you know what?
(17:32):
I'm just gonna start a religion.
You get enough people to follow, get some money, I'll be able
to live pretty good.
So I get the same kind of vibefrom this Mr Norton guy.
And so, yeah, in September 1859, he sends a letter to the San
Francisco Daily Bulletin wherehe basically said I'm
(17:57):
proclaiming myself as theemperor of the country and I'm
ordering all the representativesof the other states of the
Union to come out here tomusical hall on February,
february 1st, and start fixingsome, some of these laws.
Let's start, let's fix thegovernment.
You know, meet me over here and, and you know, we'll get
everything figured out.
(18:17):
No one really listened to thisguy.
Unfortunately, or fortunately,however you may say, and um, or
fortunately, however you may say, and yeah.
So, even though no one listenedto him, he just kept going, he
went through, he kept just hekind of kept making
(18:38):
proclamations, kind of didn'tlet anyone get in his way, and
just I figure it's one of thosethings, fake it till you make it
, I'm just going to keep.
I'm the emperor, no one cantell me otherwise.
Emperor is a pretty high rankof government, I would say.
So I think you figure, just hey, I'm the emperor, I can do what
I want.
He's going to keep going.
So a couple other proclamations.
(18:58):
He made October 12, 1859, hemade October 12, 1859, he
formally abolished the UnitedStates Congress and to the point
where January 1860, so a couplemonths later, he summoned the
US, the army, to depose of theelected officials of US Congress
(19:22):
because they were in violationof the imperial edict by
continuing business as plannedin Congress.
So he basically says I'm anemperor, and because I'm saying
that I'm an emperor, congress isno more.
Dissolve Congress, I'm going totake over now, don't worry
about it, everybody, just comeout to San Francisco, we'll get
(19:44):
this all figured out, we'll begood to go.
And then when everybody ignoredhim and he was all like I guess
he was all upset about that.
A couple months later he saysI'm going to get the army to do
it.
You know these guys are now,think, continuing running
Congress and running thegovernment without me involved.
(20:05):
So I'm going to tell the armyto go arrest them.
I'm wondering if anybodyactually listened to him.
Could you imagine like some guyfrom the army just shows up at
the White House like, hey, I'mhere to arrest you guys?
Emperor Norton from SanFrancisco sent me so he's trying
to fix everything over inCalifornia while things were
(20:26):
going a little haywire over herewith the Civil War.
So I don't know, maybe he hadsomething figured out there.
A couple things he did weren'tactually crazy.
A couple of things he didweren't actually crazy.
A couple of things that he said.
He actually called for thedevelopment of a League of
Nations, similar to what our boyWoodrow Wilson tried to set
(20:46):
forth in the 14 points, althoughsome people maybe present,
company excluded, in other words, a certain person who may not
be present on the podcast thatnormally is may also think that
that is crazy, but that waslisted in Wikipedia as something
that wasn't crazy, so I'm goingto go with it.
(21:07):
He forbade any conflict betweenreligions.
That's pretty good.
And he called for theconstruction of a bridge from
Oakland to San Francisco theonly thing I can think of with
that is maybe he was just sickof the traffic.
He had to get from A to B andhe wasn't getting anywhere, so
he was looking out for the restof the people by trying to get a
(21:28):
bridge built and ultimately itwas built.
San Francisco-Oakland BayBridge was built and since it's
been built there have been a lotof people who have been trying
to get the name of the bridge tobe the Emperor Norton Bridge,
but to no avail.
It's still, I believe, calledthe San Francisco-Oakland Bay
Bridge.
Haven't been across that one,but I guess my guess is it
(21:52):
connects San Francisco withOakland or just goes over what's
called the Oakland Bay.
Haven't been across that one,but I guess my guess is it
connects San Francisco withOakland or just goes over what's
called the Oakland Bay.
I've never been there, so Iassume those are both things.
How he made these proclamationshe would just write letters to
the local newspapers and theywould post them.
It was kind of like a wholething.
They just kind of embraced thisas kind of.
(22:15):
At one point I'm thinking, isthis guy for real?
But then, as I did moreresearch, it was kind of like
the people of San Francisco justkind of embraced this guy,
being kind of a weirdo, but theyliked it, it was entertaining
to them, so they would post allthis stuff and especially the
Oakland Bay Bridge.
I live in the Philadelphia areaand if someone were to post
something anybody was to postsome law to improve the traffic
(22:42):
around here I think that mightget some traction on the local
news maybe now, but in realitythis guy was pretty wild.
He's a pretty crazy guy.
He spent his days, quoteunquote, expecting the streets,
spending time in the parks andlibraries, so basically he was
homeless.
It seems like he was walkingthe streets, inspecting the
(23:03):
streets.
He was commenting on theintegrity of sidewalks and kind
of just trying to be.
I like to think of it as, likeyou know, have you ever called
anybody like, oh, that guy iswalking around, like he's the
mayor of the place.
So I feel like this was like hewas kind of the self-proclaimed
, like he was running the showand everyone was listening to
this guy.
He wore a uniform that wassecond-handed to him by army
(23:25):
officers wore a beaver hat withpeacock or ostrich feathers, a
walking stick and umbrella.
So that's where I'm getting to.
Pretty good costume Wear aCivil War era army uniform with
a beaver hat, some feathers init, boom Easy Halloween costume.
(23:48):
He was arrested in 1867.
And they wanted toinvoluntarily commit him for a
mental disorder.
But all the citizens of SanFrancisco got all upset and he
got released and the policeactually apologized to him for
arresting him and after thisarrest the San Francisco police
officers would salute him in thestreet.
(24:09):
So yeah, I mean, the 1870 USCensus actually listed Norton's
occupation as emperor, which youwould think.
Oh, I guess he was validated.
But it also notes that he'sinsane.
So a little bit of A little up,a little down, but yeah, it was
(24:29):
pretty cool.
He issued his own money with hisname on it.
Some people would accept it.
I think it was more of acharity thing.
You print out your own money.
I think about Parks andRecreation If you ever have seen
that show where John Ralphioand Tom Haverford start their
business Entertainment 720, andput their names on the faces or
(24:53):
in Always Sunny in Philadelphia,when they created Patty's Box
to try to stir up the economy,people accepted it More like a
coupon that you write foryourself.
The notes were between $0.50and $ and 10.
He was in love with queenvictoria of england.
(25:15):
He wrote letters to hersuggesting that they should
marry to strengthen theirnations, but the queen never
responded.
But lucky for me, I have chatgpt um and john's favorite, so
he would be proud of me.
I'll read it to you here.
I'll do my best.
Queen Victoria impression.
Dear Emperor Norton, what asplendid surprise to receive
(25:39):
your proposal.
I must say your offer hasbrought me more joy in a
particularly well-brewed pot oftea, though I fear I have never
been one to say yes to aproposal quite so unexpectedly
as the self-proclaimed emperorof the United States your title
is as unique as your reign and Imust admit it has piqued my
(26:01):
curiosity.
However, marrying a man whorules from afar seems like it
would require a rather extensivetravel budget, not to mention
an arsenal of fancy hats toimpress the diplomatic crowd.
Budget, not to mention anarsenal of fancy hats to impress
the diplomatic crowd.
I can't help but wonder how ourwedding would be received.
A queen and an emperor unite?
Will there be corgis at theceremony, or shall we invite
(26:23):
your collection of extraordinarypigeons instead?
The royal gossip would bepositively delighted, though my
advisors might have a fit.
While I do appreciate yourimaginative spirit and your
dedication to the title you'vebestowed upon yourself, I must
graciously decline your offer.
My responsibilities as queenkeep me quite busy, and it would
(26:44):
be difficult to explain to mysubjects why I'd be spending my
afternoons conferring with anemperor about the best way to
serve scones.
Thank you for your laughter andyour proposal has brought me.
May your reign be filled withwhimsical adventures and a
delightful proclamations.
Yours with the fondest regards.
Victoria R.
Now I don't know.
(27:10):
I don't want to speak forEmperor Norton, but I think if
he would have gotten that as aresponse, he might have gone a
little bit deeper into insanity.
She really put the screws tohim in this letter, even though
it's fictitious.
Maybe that is how she wouldhave said it If she said stuff
about her advisors having a fit.
All you're thinking about isbest ways to serve scones.
(27:33):
Having it fit All you'rethinking about is best ways to
serve scones.
That your proposal made herlaugh.
I mean, those have just beenheartbreaking for him.
So maybe we're lucky that shedidn't respond, because it could
have created quite theinternational stir there.
Also, a bit of an editor's noteas I read through this letter
again, I couldn't help butrealize that some of her excuses
(27:54):
were the travel she didn't havethe budget for travel to visit
with him or she's too busy asthe queen.
There's all these things thatyou know.
You got to give him more creditthan that.
I mean, that's a pretty goodcop-out, pretty realistic way
for someone to avoid juststraight up turning them down,
(28:19):
thinking that you're crazy, likeshe could have just said and I
know this letter is fictitious,but I'm just thinking like she
could have responded back likedude, you're crazy, I'm an
actual queen and I can't be seen, you know, around you.
Maybe that would have been abetter thing than ignoring him,
because then he never had anyonetell him the truth.
(28:39):
They're like dude, you're nuts,and maybe if it would have came
from Queen Victoria, maybe hewould have been able to clean up
his act and pick himself up bythe bootstraps and get his stuff
back in order.
Bootstraps and get his stuffback in order.
(29:01):
So unfortunately he died onJanuary 8th 1880 at the age of
61, 62, 60.
I mean, who really knows?
He collapsed in the street, Iguess, and no one was there to
revive him or anything, and hedied on the sidewalk.
I believe he died in completepoverty.
He had five or six bucks in hispocket and one gold coin that
(29:22):
was worth maybe $2.50 at home,so he's worth eight.
He came to the country.
It's the opposite of theAmerican dream you come to the
country with a nickel in yourpocket, turn into millions.
He came to the country with$40,000 in 1849 and died with
maybe $8.
So not the best, not the best,but hey, you know what Sounds
(29:46):
like he had fun doing it and whoknows how many of his Emperor
Norton bucks he had.
So I guess he was doing okayfor himself.
Emperor Norton Bucks he had, soI guess he was doing okay for
himself.
Also found his house was a faketelegram from the Tsar
Alexander of Russiacongratulating him on his
forthcoming marriage to QueenVictoria.
This guy is living in a fantasyworld, but hey, he was having
(30:16):
fun.
You kind of think about it.
What harm is it If it's realityto you?
Hey, who knows?
So he lived his life thinkinghe was the emperor of the United
States, king of Hawaii, waslike, okay, he had one person
following him.
So, like I said, you only needone.
He had at least one person.
He had the whole city of SanFrancisco, the police saluting
(30:36):
him, the whole city was all overhim.
They all loved him.
The fan favorite.
10,000 people came to hisviewing before his funeral.
I guess you would consider hima folk hero in San Francisco.
I don't know if many people Iwould think maybe people from
San Francisco might know who heis.
Nobody over here does.
I don't know if he's taught inhistory classes now I was just
(31:00):
talking to my nephew today.
He's in 7th grade and he'sstarting to learn American
history.
So I said, oh, that's cool,what are you learning about?
And he said the Ice Age.
I'm like the Ice Age.
How is that that anything?
How does that have to do withamerican history and the ice age
?
I don't know, the ice age wouldbe earth science.
(31:20):
I mean, I guess maybe you needto learn a little bit about the,
the uh, ice age, and I guesshe's talking about the bering
strait, I think, and the bridgethat was Is that what it is?
The bridge that at one pointconnected Russia to Alaska and
that's how the people came overfrom there to populate North
(31:42):
America.
So maybe that's where he'scoming from.
It's a stretch, but yeah, sothey might be too busy teaching
about the Ice Age than EmperorNorton, unfortunately.
They might be too busy teachingabout the ice age than emperor
Norton, unfortunately.
Um, or anybody like this.
But um, pretty fun, I mean I,you know, when I first like kind
of what I, when I first heardabout it, the initial thought
(32:02):
that I have is like this guy wasfor real and he was an actual
political figure and he justdecided to do that.
But as I read more and more, Ikind of I realized that he's
more of some crazy guy roamingthe streets of San Francisco and
the people from San Franciscojust embraced him and looked out
for him, the people whoaccepted his money for food and
(32:24):
restaurants.
They're just like.
I'll give him a break.
I think he's just like a townidiot and I think people just
liked him for it.
He was harmless as long as hewasn't doing any harm, which I
don't think he really did at anypoint and I think people just
liked him for it Harmless aslong as he wasn't doing any harm
, which I don't think he reallydid at any point.
I think he was.
They liked him.
Reminds me of growing up in alocal mall near me.
There was this homeless guy wholived in the mall.
(32:44):
Everybody knew about thishomeless guy and he had this
shanty built in the woods rightacross the street from this mall
and he would walk through themall and I guess when he would
get enough money he would go andget a coffee or anything.
Everyone knew about this guyand he was super homeless but
(33:05):
harmless.
From all reports he was in thenews In the local news.
I remember at one point, I think, they were going to In this
wooded area that he was living.
They were either going todevelop it or the authorities
caught wind of it and they weregoing to force him to move and
everyone was like no, no, no, heshould be able to stay.
(33:26):
He should be able to live in ashanty in the woods near the
mall.
He's not harming anybody, whichis true.
But I the woods near the mall,he's not harming anybody, which
is true.
But I guess now you think aboutit.
Maybe you have a GoFundMeaccount for him.
Maybe get him an apartment orsomething.
Maybe clean him up, get him ajob, I don't know.
But yeah, it kind of remindedme of him.
One of those situations wherewhat's not to like about him?
(33:52):
He's just minding his ownbusiness.
It's pretty wild, but take thebull by the horns.
That's what Emperor Norton did.
Maybe we can all learn a littlebit from him.
You got to feel for him alittle bit.
You know you lose that moneylike that.
You think you're going to bemaking out something good.
Then a couple of Peruvians pullthe wool over your eyes Take 25
(34:12):
G's from you.
They flipped the switch.
He was trying to corner themarket.
And then the Peruvians werelike we got one, we're going to
get one over on you.
Fine, you want to buy this for12 cents a piece?
Sure, go ahead.
We're going to send four moreships full of rice.
So I was wondering, you know, Imean I don't know Rice-a-roni,
the San Francisco treat, Iwonder if there has anything to
(34:34):
do with Emperor Norton.
I feel like national bohemianbeer that's in Maryland.
From what my dad tells me,every can of that had the story
of the Maryland blue crab.
Maybe rice-a-roni, every boxshould have a little story of
Emperor Norton.
Or, hey, anyone trying to getinto the rice business, maybe
(34:56):
you make it Emperor Norton'sRice.
Somebody might buy that.
That'd be kind of cool.
Rest in peace, emperor Norton.
I hope somebody here might wantto dress up for him as
Halloween.
Like I said, just get a CivilWar army uniform, throw a beaver
hat on there and you'd be goodto go One side, one kind of side
(35:19):
interesting thing about him ora little side story In San
Francisco during his reign Iguess you would call it a
20-year reign, basically, if youwant to call it that there were
these two dogs, these famousdogs.
San Francisco seemed to be apretty crazy I guess not much
different than maybe what youwould consider it now, or like
when hippies were there, just amore of a counterculture type
(35:41):
situation, kind of embracing theweird.
Back then stray dogs were areally big problem in the cities
of the United States, to thepoint where, in the 1840s
apparently, in Los Angeles, dogsoutnumbered people two to one,
which is crazy.
(36:02):
They would be poisoned, trapped, killed just trying to get rid
of all these stray dogs.
Peta would have a freaking fitat this point.
But I guess if you figure theseshelters, I mean it's not quite
that, but there's a lot of dogsin these shelters.
So it happens these dogs arekind of all over if you don't
control them.
But anyway, if a dog turned outto be like a good ratter, like
(36:24):
it could kill rats, people wouldmark these dogs as these good
ratters and control the ratproblem.
So it was like they wereearning their keep.
I guess you could say beingable to live out in the being
stray dogs, as long as you cantake care of the rats.
Because I guess there's onething worse than a bunch of
stray dogs, it's a bunch ofdirty rats running around the
(36:46):
city.
So there were these two dogs inSan Francisco.
Their names were Bummer andLazarus, and they were Bummer,
or Bummer was a Newfoundland andLazarus was some unknown breed.
They were like the best rattersin San Francisco.
So they were like these heroes,these hero dogs People love
these dogs and they kind ofteamed up.
(37:07):
They were like boys and theywere just.
They would roam the streets,kill rats, and just, everyone
loved them.
At one point they finished theykilled 85 rats in 20 minutes
apparently, which is that's somegood numbers there.
And it just so happened thataround this time Emperor Norton
was roaming the streets too, andI feel like they're all kindred
(37:30):
spirits and there were reportsthat they were always in the
company of each other and thedogs would walk around with
Emperor Norton.
So it was kind of a team.
And there was this cartoon thatI found online.
I was posted, I guess, in anewspaper, and there was a
cartoon.
It was a cartoon and it was.
(37:50):
The cartoon was Emperor Nortonwas at this table with a spread
of food and he was eating andthe dogs were sitting there like
dogs do, like trying to beg forfood and stuff, and the title
of the cartoon was the threebummers.
So I guess it's.
(38:11):
Not only are these stray dogs abummer, but also this town
idiot who thinks he's theemperor of the United States is
also a bummer, which is a bummer, because that would basically
be calling Norton a sad sack.
Pretty funny, I don't know, Ithought that was funny.
(38:34):
I wanted to add that.
So, emperor Norton, we speakyour name and I think there
should be a movie and peopleshould know about this person.
I think that's pretty much it.
I wanted to send them off.
Send Emperor Norton off with alittle song here, just to pay my
respects to the man.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
All right, here we go .
There's a hero.
If you look inside your heart,you don't have to be afraid of
what you are.
If you reach into your soul andthe sorrow that you know will
(39:45):
melt away.
And then a hero comes along,emperor Norton, with the
(40:09):
strength to carry on.
You cast your fears aside andyou know you can survive.
So when you feel like hope isgone, look inside you and be
strong, and you'll finally seethe truth that a hero lies in
you.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
All right, everybody.
So if you're ever going andcrossing the San
Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge,point your finger up in the sky
for one Emperor Norton, becausewithout him the bridge probably
would have still been built.
But you never know, and that'sit.
That's it for this episode.
(40:45):
I don't know, it's pretty dry,I assume, but I wanted to get it
out there.
Let me see if I can get John onthe phone here.
Hold on, yeah, hey, john, it'smatt.
(41:11):
I got you here on the podcast.
I did an.
I did a solo episode no, no,you didn't yeah you're on the
air, dude.
oh, thanks, I'm happy to be aspecial guest.
Yeah, how you?
How you feeling, feeling so.
So, yeah, any of our fans outthere, I'm getting over a bit of
a.
I don't know.
(41:31):
It might be a sinus infection,a few allergies, a head cold.
I mean just all the above.
You know I just started a newjob in Baltimore, working in the
historic Inner Harbor.
Yeah, it's a bit of anadjustment.
Sorry, fans, I know I've been alittle wayward with you.
Maybe you got something fromthe bay.
(41:54):
The harbor Was part of yourfirst day of the job.
To take a dive in the harbor Inorder for me to meet my
probationary period.
Yes, I must dive in the harborat some point, or just drink a
glass full of the water straightfrom there.
Yes, it'll happen the last dayof my initiation.
(42:18):
It will be sure to happen.
Well, yeah, congratulations.
I kind of went through thewhole You're washing hands that
we were talking about earlierand how that's part of the issue
that you wash your hands toomuch Went over that a little bit
.
But really, what I did, I hopeyou're okay with it.
I know you haven't been, we'vebeen talking about it for a
(42:40):
while, but I just did the oldsummary on our boy, emperor
Norton, solo yeah.
Yeah so you got any finalthoughts, just anything.
I kind of went through thewhole thing.
I read a letter, a response,that A fictitious response from
(43:00):
Queen Victoria to his request tomarry her.
So that'll be fun for you tolisten to.
I figure that just kind ofbringing the spirit of you in
there.
But you got anything to say.
Any thoughts on Emperor Nortonoff the top?
Speaker 2 (43:14):
of your head.
Speaker 1 (43:15):
Well, I just wonder if James Buchanan had listened
to any of his advice.
Maybe, I don't know Maybe theCivil War could have been
diverted.
There's kind of talk of whatcould have been.
I think him taking on the ideaof being the protector of Mexico
was a bold step in his platform.
(43:35):
Yeah we didn't get to that point.
We didn't get to there becausethey had that boze.
We didn't get to that point, wedidn't get to there because
they had that bozo.
France invaded Mexico becauseMexico couldn't repay them for
their help in their civil war.
Correct, that's right.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
Yeah so.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
Napoleon III decided to take extra measures.
Decided to take extra measures?
Yeah, so they sent some clownfrom the monarchy over there to
sit there.
Austria-Hungary from.
Maximilian I is who they endedup agreeing to send.
He came from Austria-Hungary.
Yeah, he ended up gettingkilled.
(44:14):
I don't know if we ever talkedabout it.
We might have talked about himon the podcast.
He ended up getting killed justbecause, right, yeah, he kind
of got shafted.
Everyone was like, yeah, we feelbad for him, but like he was
deposed, and they're like, well,we have to kill him, even if he
himself is not a bad guy.
It's like we just we broughtback our republic, like we
deposed the monarchy, we have tokill the guy, like it's just
(44:34):
for show at the very least.
And then, yeah, they had hiscorpse on display and for for
any of our fans, if you justtype in Maximilian into Google
Maximilian I in funeralprocession or whatever, it'll
show pictures of him and he'sjust rotting.
His corpse is just rotting.
Yeah, he's on display in acourt somewhere, yeah, so,
(44:55):
anyway.
So they had Maximilian.
France sent him from Austria,hungary, whatever.
So then I guess the people ofMexico felt as though they
didn't have a protector, orthere was no protector assigned,
like looking out for the peopleof Mexico.
So Emperor Norton took it uponhimself to add that to his
titles.
Correct.
Yeah, I mean the selfless guyall around.
(45:17):
You know he wanted to do areally good thing.
I'm sure you talked about itand I can't look forward to
hearing more about it.
But about the rice, you know hewanted to feed people.
He really wanted it Well.
I think maybe he learned hislesson from trying to take
advantage of people While tryingto corner a market that he
obviously knew nothing aboutyeah, usually never a good.
(45:40):
So it's kind of hard to cornera market in general, but it's
even harder to corner one youliterally know zero about.
But he tried.
He gave it his best shot.
Yeah he was a good guy.
I think he was just Somethinglike that happens, a couple of
Peruvians take advantage of youlike that, and that's enough to
(46:01):
piss off the Pope, and I thinkthat's really what happened to
him.
And he just cracked and thenjust tried to make the most of
it.
Tried to run for governorDidn't work.
Then he just tried to take downthe American government from
the top.
He just went right to the topand that's where I got from.
Yeah, did you mention therestaurant?
There's still a bar named afterhim in San Francisco.
(46:23):
No, no, there's still a barnamed after him.
Yeah, there's still a placenamed after him.
Speaker 2 (46:26):
Well, I was talking about how he had that.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
He had that money and he had the money and some
people would take it, somepeople wouldn't.
I feel like it was just charity.
He was just a charity case andI think people just.
He was just a charity case and Ithink people just kind of like
he was harmless and they let himgo Bit of an eccentric and
that's kind of that's been SanFrancisco's bag for a long time.
(46:51):
Some would say so yeah, he'sdefinitely a man of his time and
place and I think all of us andall of our fans can, uh, we can
say we can wish them the best.
Uh, yeah, I said hey, I toldhim.
If you guys are, I said if youguys ever find yourself driving
over the San Francisco OaklandBay bridge, you know, put a
(47:11):
finger up in the air for EdwardNorton or Emperor Norton,
because Might not have beenbuilt without him and Edward
Norton, and Edward Norton andsome good movies.
Let's see.
Yeah, so, okay.
Yeah.
So, john, the way that I wastying this in because we try to
tie things into current times orwhatever the way that I timed
it in and how I got into thesituation was Halloween's coming
(47:36):
up.
Right, it's October,halloween's coming up.
So I was thinking maybe withyour new job, maybe you have
something like this, maybethere's some competition at work
where you're trying to, youhave to dress up, best costume
wins, most unique costume wins,or something like that.
(47:56):
Maybe you want to teachsomebody something while you're
dressed up.
So I thought Edward, I thoughtEmperor Norton.
I wonder if Edward Norton'snamed after him.
You know what I mean.
I think that's actually thenext logical question to ask,
because you've only said hisname five times.
I did, I did it a couple oftimes and, honestly, when I was
filling out, when I was goingthrough ChatGPT to get that
(48:18):
response from Queen Victoria atfirst, I wrote write a response
to Edward Norton's letter and itcame up and it was like oh,
you're an actor, like what?
But anyway, my thought was Onething that I thought of is, of
all the people that come to yourmind that we've talked about on
the podcast, any historicalfigure.
(48:38):
Who would you want to dress upas for Halloween the most?
Who would you want to dress upas for Halloween the most?
Who would you do?
I mean, the Jack of my heart isTedus Caciusco, of course, of
course, that would be yours, myJack of hearts, whether he was a
(48:58):
diamond or not.
Yes, tedus Caciusco would be mynumber one Halloween choice.
Okay, and yourself.
I had said I forget his firstname, but Gato, gato, gato, gato
, gato.
Speaker 2 (49:14):
Yeah, but it'd be tough to and Sean Garfield.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Yeah, I was wondering , you know, and this will be a
little bit of a repeat for thefans, but I was just kind of
wondering if, um, if, uh, likeyou could do that tastefully, if
, like, the you know statute ofthat being funny has passed yet
or not.
Well, I think, just theshenanigans he pulled after the
(49:43):
fact not the fact that he shot apresident, but how he sang a
song up to the gallows and howhe had that really sweet prayer
that he wrote, just the idea ofgetting a job.
I expected a federal job and anambassadorship in France,
because you know I'm and youknow it's funny, you bring that
(50:05):
up because you know he couldhave just pulled an Emperor
Norton, but he didn't.
He tried to.
Maybe he should have done that.
He should have just said hey,you know what, I'm the
ambassador of France.
Move to France and just say I'mnow.
I wonder if he met emperor nor,and emperor normer says you
want to?
Here's, I got a great idea foryou go to this train station at
(50:26):
this hour, you won't miss.
The president should be there.
Just just talk to him.
Just go talk to him.
And maybe something was lost intranslation.
Yeah, oh, man, but yeah, so,yeah, all right, there you go.
That's, that's john's thing.
And hey, I guess, um, hopefullywe'll give a little bit of a
tease to the next episode.
Um, john and I made anothertrip to philadelphia and we um
(50:51):
did some sightseeing.
I'll just leave it at that.
So you know, I think our nextepisode that we're together,
hopefully john's feeling betterand we can get back to, back to
the old uh, weekly or bi-weekly,you know, you know, hopefully
at least bi-weekly, is itbi-weekly?
Speaker 2 (51:07):
it's bi-weekly, every other week I would like every
week every week.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
Yeah, we're gonna play it by ear.
Fans, look, I miss it.
I feel lousy.
You'll probably hear it in myvoice even coming through the uh
, you know the phone speaker,you know as a guest caller.
But I want to clear.
I want to bring my best.
I want to bring my 100% for youall.
So thank you for being patientwith us.
Thank you to my co-host, matt,for taking the initiative and
(51:35):
deciding to put on a soloepisode without my knowing.
I appreciate the foresight andthe go-getter-ness.
Well, you know like I startedoff, I saw that bill for
$40-some for my Buzzsproutserver and I thought to myself
I'm not getting anything forthat, so I might as well just
(51:56):
put something out there for thefans.
More for me, more for the fans,but also for me.
Well, it, more for the fans,but also for me.
I think it's for us.
We got to start.
We're happy to bring our fansalong with the journey.
We love you guys, but at theend of the day, we love doing
this, we love talking history,we love talking different
perspectives and, yeah, wereally hope you guys stay with
(52:19):
us.
Stick with us.
Maybe we'll do another OJepisode soon and, yeah, we
really hope you guys stay withus.
Stick with us.
Cool, well said, maybe we'll doanother OJ episode soon,
because that seems to be the big.
I was hanging out with Emily Mearlier today and she was asking
when we're going to be ready tohave her back on.
Okay, well, then there you go,fans.
You already know what's comingahead.
Yeah, so all right.
(52:39):
Well, john, I appreciate it.
I'm surprised you answered, butI'm glad you did, because I was
uh, just just, uh, 56 minutesin by myself.
Thank you for deciding.
Have you called anybody?
Any other fan?
Speaker 2 (52:55):
no, no one else would answer.
Speaker 1 (52:56):
Let's be honest, okay .
Well, if I'm being totallyfrank, I matt's calling me at
time of the week, so thephillies were in game two in
their series with the new yorknets.
I thought he was calling to sayhey, did you see that ending?
It was a classic, instantclassic.
And, uh, now I'm a littleshocked that I'm on air now.
You know what?
(53:16):
I for my own history podcast.
I'm not even in the studio, I'mliterally calling in from a
phone.
Well, I'll tell you, I wasrecording this podcast as the
innings 8 and 9 went on, becauseevery time I stopped watching I
(53:36):
took a shower.
The Phillies were down.
I took a shower.
I came out, the Phillies weretied.
I started watching it again.
The Mets got back up ahead.
You took a shower, the Phillieswere down.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
I took a shower.
Speaker 1 (53:45):
I came out, the Phillies were tied.
I started watching it again.
The Mets got back up ahead.
You took another shower.
No, I just said to myself I amnot going to watch the rest of
this game.
I'm a little superstitious likethat.
It sounds to me.
I don't even know how itfinished yet, but it sounds to
me like it was a good call.
I to me like it was a good call.
So I finished.
It was an extraordinary call Iwas getting.
You were wanting the Philliesto pull it out.
(54:06):
Yes, and I was, so I'm happyfor that.
My phone's been getting blownup the whole time.
It did distract me a little bitthrough the episode, but I think
I went through it and yeah, soI'm gonna have to catch up on
that once I get off of here.
But I just wanted to thank Johnfor hopping in and you know, I
(54:26):
just wanted to get this out, seehow it goes.
It's going to be wonderful.
Nothing against you, john, Iwas just.
I was itching and I just I knewyou were feeling bad and I
didn't know if we were going tobe able to get this Edward
Norton, this Emperor Nortonepisode out, and I know't know
if we were going to be able toget this Edward Norton, this
Emperor Norton episode out.
And I know you're antsy to talkabout our trip to Philadelphia,
(54:46):
so I figure you know why don'tI just do this in the meantime,
and then hopefully, when we comeback we'll come out, you know
throwing fists yeah.
Talk.
You know Philly's baseballhistory, something you know.
Maybe, Maybe you know Philly'sbaseball history, something you
know, maybe.
Maybe you know we'll just play.
We'll play it by ear.
So, fans again.
We're always happy to hear yourinput and your suggestions.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Yeah, and you know what fans the text line.
Speaker 1 (55:10):
Yeah, and you know, shoot us a text, and you know
what I was thinking is shoot usa text and let us know a couple
things about Halloween.
You know what's your favoritecostume, what person from
American history that we'vecovered on here, or any history
that you would want to dress up.
as for a costume competition,Choose a text and let us know
(55:31):
and we'll read your answers outloud in the next episode.
And if you do, matt and I willshare with you our new favorite
mustard.
That's the trade-off.
It's a big one, that's a tease.
Our new favorite mustard,that's the trade-off.
Speaker 2 (55:42):
It's a big one.
Speaker 1 (55:42):
That's a tease.
That's a tease, that's a bigold tease for our next episode.
Thanks for hanging with us,matt.
Thanks for giving me a call,thanks for letting me be on the
show.
I didn't feel right not havinga whole episode without you, of
course.
Speaker 2 (55:58):
It didn't feel right.
Speaker 1 (55:59):
I appreciate the call All right, john.
Well, hey, you feel better andwe'll see you on the next one.
All right, sounds good, you gotanything to leave the listeners
.
You know it.
Stay curious, all right, seeyou, john, see you guys.
All right fans.
Well, that was pretty cool.
(56:19):
I didn't think he was actuallygoing to answer, so glad we got
it.
We got a little bit of john inthere, probably the most
exciting part of the podcast.
I think I drug on a little bit,um, talking about emperor
norton, but uh, he was prettybig, he was a pretty, uh,
interesting guy and I think johnpretty got brought a pretty
good perspective to tieeverything in.
So, um, I guess that's it.
(56:42):
We'll see you on the next one,as they say, or hear you on the
next one, hopefully.
Don't forget to follow us onTwitter at at Nailing History.
Shoot us an email atnailinghistorypod at gmailcom or
, as always, hit that link inthe description and send us the
old text message All right guys,have a good one, come on and we
(57:20):
say bye-bye.
Sorry, fans, I messed that up.
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