August 20, 2024 • 33 mins
We're taking a U-Turn back to season four. What would you do if you were stranded for months on a cold, blizard-ridden mountain top with your family and little to no food? More importantly, who would you eat first? Even more importantly, what part would you eat first? Karmen and Jessica are in California visiting Donner's Pass, where the infamous Donner Party decided to take matters into their own hands and become cannibals. They truck in over to Truckee to learn about its dark past. It's getting serious over here. Don't miss your exit.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Navigating to small town US A shoe markers. For one,
(00:28):
are we challiet? Hey, Jessica hate carbon? How are you okay?
I think I always say I'm doing okay. I don't
know is there I should probably get to a point
where I say like, great.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thank you, very well, thank you very well, very well. One.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
I don't think people can see it, but my teeth
are batty white and white.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
What are you using?
Speaker 3 (00:56):
I use that optic white color beve.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
It's coldgate.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Dazzling white.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I would say they are dazzling. They're like bright, like
put those in a black light.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Ooh yeah, how sexy would that be?
Speaker 4 (01:12):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah? I could do a pearl Drops commercial.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Ooh, pearl drops. Do you remember the pearl Drops commercials?
Are you too young?
Speaker 2 (01:22):
No?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I remember? I mean I know what they are. I
don't remember that the commercial specifically, but I do know
what the pear drops are.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
I wanted the pearl Drops so bad, and then I
got it finally, when I was old enough to buy
my own. My mom would never buy it for me,
and I realized what it is. It's just sandpaper, liquid sand,
liquid sand. Yeah, it's like a minted liquid sand that
you used to upbraid your teeth and take off the
enamel and hopefully underneath this white.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
But in the meantime, lose your enamel. Yeah, it's very
very gritty. It's very gritty.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
And then there was the red colgate. Do you remember that?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Uh huh yeah, Oh my god, I wanted that's so bad.
That was such a right, ye wasn't that? It was
a beautiful toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Yeah, Jel Redjel almost shimmered a little bit in there.
Oh yeah, Now they have sparkles in it.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Oh my gosh, I love I love a toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yay toothpaste, That's what I said. Yay for toothpaste.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
Yeay for toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Where are we hanging enough toothpaste? You might need to
brush your teeth after this episode, because you know, we're
passing through Donnor's Pass on our way through the Lincoln Highway.
And if you've heard of the Donors Pass or Donner's Party,
you have an idea of what happened there. Eight people,
the eight people to survive for the most part, I
(02:43):
think some I don't know.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It just became fun.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Yeah. So we are again, we're headed down the Lincoln Highway.
We're still in California and Donner's Pass is I think
one of the highest points on the Lincoln Highway and
it was probably the most treacherous. Yeah, so there is
a town called Donner and then obviously Donner's Past and
it was named after the infamous Donner Party. And you know,
(03:07):
we always like to talk about cannibalism on this show.
For some reason, most of our episodes, somehow we fit
it in. I don't know why, but interesting, it is interesting.
But this is probably one of the most famous cases
of cannibalism in the United States. And so let's talk
about you know, Donner was named after the Donner Party,
(03:29):
so prior to that had no had no incorporation. It
really doesn't have any a lot of things going on
there right now except for that it's right next to
like Tahoe, so it's a beautiful area. And same thing
with Trucky. It's right on the top of that like
Tahoe area, and so lots of hiking, lots of that
stuff happening, nature guide skiing.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, so Trucki is actually one of the snowyest places
in America.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Wow, great skiing, great skiing there.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And that gives you an idea of like if it's
one of the snowyest areas in the US, then you
know the point of where the Donner Party came through.
I think there was like eighty one people originally in
the Donner Party headed west towards California. I think did
they start in Missouri.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
I want to say they started in Illinois.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Illinois, Say Illinois. I prefer to say Illinois. So the
history is that if you were moving, if you are
traveling west in what you know, but by horseback, by train,
wagon train basically at this time, that it would take
you months to get through, and so you wanted to
(04:36):
cross the Sierra Nevadas as early as possible. You didn't
want to hit the snowstorms. But you also want to
make sure there's grass for your animals to eat along
the way. So the perfect timing was about leaving in
April late April and being able to get there before
the first snowstorm, get through the mountains before the first snowstorm.
And for some reason the Donner Party left out And
(05:00):
did a cannibal just bite you on my ankle?
Speaker 4 (05:07):
Damn it?
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Oh shit, I just dragged my bone across the wooden chair,
like my ankle bone.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
Well, the Donner Party instead of leaving in April for
some reason, they left mid May. So they were already
a few weeks behind what they should have been, but
they felt like they could make it across still. They
could make up good time because they had received this
possible faster trail that somebody told them about. So they
had this route that went off of their regular map
(05:40):
and that they decided that they were going to take
it to try and make up time. Well, what ended
up happening was that route was bad. It was it
was a fake route, so nobody really traveled on that before,
and it was treacherous. It was bad.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Other people don't People might not understand about this part
of the United States.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
And also, you know, like parts of in the Rocky.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Mountains in Colorado, and when you're way up high in
the Sierra Nevadas, even in May or June, you can
get trapped in a snowstorm there when you're in that
high of an elevation.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
So people who live in Tucson and Florida would not
understand seeing snow in the summertime. Oh yeah, those snowstorms.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Can hit out of nowhere and they can be dump
a lot of snow. I've lived in this area, and
you know, it can start snowing at night and you
can wake up in the morning and the snow.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Can be up over your doors.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
So it's sort of romantic and fun to think about now,
but not if you're on a horse.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
No, without a heater. And so by the time they
got to the mountains, they hit a snowstorm. They couldn't
get through it. Before the first really really heavy snowstorm hit,
they didn't have much to keep them warm. And not
only that, they had enough provision to get them through
their trips. And so when they get to Donner past
(07:00):
that area, they have to stop and they have to
kind of wade out the snowstorm. And then it just
gets worse and worse from there because they can't move forward.
Their animals certainly can't truck through the deep snow. It
was about November, I want to sackt o November when
they started getting that snowstorm and they started building huts
in different areas. Most of the travelers in the Daarna
(07:22):
party were children, most of them and more it's tender meat. Obviously,
for the first month or so, they run out of provisions. Yeah,
you know, they start eating their animals. I thought, what
are you going to do? What are you going to do?
So cold nothing can grow, They can't like grow new
crops or anything. The only thing you have maybe a
lot of is water at this point, but it's resting.
(07:45):
Yeah that's called ice. Yeah it is snow and ice. Okay.
Then what ended up happening was so they started using
the hides of the animals to kind of that leather
would keep the water from seeping in or the snowstorm
and keep a little bit more warm in their huts.
But they were starting to starve. Out of the eighty
(08:05):
one people that were traveling, fifteen decided to leave and
try to create this rescue mission. Fifteen set out on
foot to get through, and only two of the fifteen
Nadi it across. That was the first time people started
to consider eating is those fifteen individuals, because they literally
went out with nothing and except for trying to make
(08:27):
it took a month for them to get across and
get down to a settlement to start a rescue mission.
And that's that was essential that it happened, so that
people knew they were there, but it was months on
end before they got everybody out, and by that time
the verse fifteen people that went out did resort to
eating each other. So they did start debating on who
(08:50):
was going to die so that they could feed the
other person. Natural death happened, so it ended up not
having to do that. However, there were two Native Americans
their guides through this. They were a part of the
party as well, and the guide started feeling like they're
going to eat us out of the bunch who that
they might actually consider killing, they felt like their lives
(09:12):
were at risk, so they did actually leave. That made
it no, they were not because there was somebody who
decided who ended up murdering them so they did. It
was the only murders, okay, of this whole process.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Who documented their fear. That's what I'd like to know.
How is it documented?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
I'm not exactly sure, except that this is all accounts
so depended on whoever was survived. I guess the survival
because there were fifty one people that survived or fifty
some people that survived out of the eighty one.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Can I just say, there's so many reasons to keep
the secret, like I would definitely not help people.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Yeah, we ate Jim, but the fact that we have
to resort to.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
Cannibalism is one thing.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah, you know, people could have their theories and their speculations.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
We don't ever really have to admit to it.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
We could just be like, oh, he's up there somewhere,
you know, he just died in the snow, and I
keep looking.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
I mean it's a large area.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
They're not gonna, yeah find But I certainly would not
have documented. Yeah, you guys that were trying to help us,
who vocalize that their fear that we were going to
eat them, we actually did kill them and eat them.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Yeah, I don't. It was just recorded that one person
did actually murder for food, like that was the intent.
It wasn't anything else. It was because they were starting.
The rescue then started, but it took months again just
to get to them. By that time, it was like
January February by the time the first people were found.
And then at that point so many people were weak
(10:45):
that they could not bring everybody back with them the
first round, so people were left up there. They didn't
couldn't take any provisions with because it took so long
to get there, and they would take people back as
a small groups at a time until only one person
and was left. So there was the like one person
was left. I think there were a couple people left.
But at the time that they finally got to the
(11:08):
last person up there, he was alone and he was crazy.
He was crazy at that point and he had you know,
everybody had. Anytime somebody passed away from either starving or cold,
they ate them. You know, that was just some that
was kind of like the thing because they needed to survive.
And so anybody who was left that camp probably did
(11:28):
consume human because that was all they could eat at
the time. They did roast, it says in there they
were roasting body parts and eating them and consuming them.
The other thing that they would eat if they didn't
want to resort to eating human, they would take the
hide and tree bark, tree bark and hide and mix
(11:49):
it and consume like in like like a paste or whatever.
That sounds good, kind of like tree jerky.
Speaker 5 (11:57):
Yeah, the very serious question just yeah, let's say on
one of our trips, mm hmm, we found ourselves in
this situation, how long would you wait to try to
eat me?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
My god, I would not. I think you know what's
really sad or no, really funny. I guess is that
this is not the first time you've asked me this
question on this podcast. I don't think I would ever.
I don't think I could. I would be walking and
starving myself before I even considered it. I just you know,
I don't know if the circumstance would be different in that,
(12:35):
but just my feeling is that I would like lick
dirt before I would eat human against me, Right, it's not.
It's not a personal thing against you. I'm sure you
take fine, Thank you. So here's another question, pretty serious. Yeah,
let's just say you have made the decision.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Yes, I'm going to eat a person who is the
first person you would eat, like of people I know
or just people anybody in the world.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
I don't even know. That's hard. I don't want to
say I could eat anybody. Who would you eat? Jimmy
Smith's you wouldn't name? Ready, if I had to eat.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
A person, yeah, if you had to be a tall man,
m he's got that big ass.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
So I think people would probably you could think of
it as like, Okay, who do I really dislike? Right? No,
I love No, I'm saying like some people go that way,
I think, and then the person might go, who's going
to sustain me the longest? Yeah, it's going to provide
me with the most for the longest, right, right.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
And I think if you're a really sick o person,
sicker than this conversation, you might consider who's gonna taste best?
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Okay?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
I would think okay, I would think vegetarians probably taste
the best.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Grasp it or what I mean?
Speaker 2 (13:56):
I think vegetarians would probably taste the best fruits and
vegetables and hold grains.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Sure, very healthy.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
But again, we live in a.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Society where there's food every freaking place. There's no way
we would ever be anywhere where there wasn't food within
a few miles, you know. And even if you crash
a plane and you managed to survive, there's so much
food on a plane. Yeah, right, Like every kid has
a diaper bag filled with goldfish and cheerios.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Right, I would take those. I would take them right away.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Is it inappropriate to just use one of your injured
piers as bait for like a bear.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Or a mountain lion?
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Yeah, so this is what I'm thinking.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
We could sharpen a stick, a big stick, several big
sticks to kill a bear, right, and we could use
the hurt person, like put them out there naked on
a rope, crying like I've seen on TV. And then
when the large animal comes to consume the prey, we
get the animal, and then we.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
All have food. This is simple stuff.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
Yeah, you think the pioneers were on this right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Come on, come on, guys.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
There's elephant stuffs up there.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
I think it was really dumb of them to kill
the guides because yeah, more than likely they're your ticket
to at least the best type of survival you can have.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
So not the first dumb decision they made, no, not.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
So this is what I think should have happened. Okay.
So you get to a point where you've already left
late okay, and before the mountains, you're still in the
plain area. You're maybe in the desert, the warm area. Okay, Yes,
you don't have enough provisions to get you across, and
you kind of know that you're pushing it. You might
run into trouble. So why take the risk with your
(15:42):
entire family comprised of mostly children. Why would you risk
it for the biscuit? Why would you go across? Because uh,
why not just plant and say, like, you know what
this is good enough for this year. Let's try again
next year. Let's just plant our seeds here and then
you know, we go across next season.
Speaker 6 (16:01):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Because the man was in charge, right, and he didn't
want to ask for directions, and he didn't know how
to read a map.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
He got a tip from a local to take another route.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, and then he yeah, he was gonna make really
good time and so, and he didn't want to listen.
Speaker 6 (16:20):
To his wife who was nagging in the wagon, nagging
in the wagon, saying, oh my god, honey, oh my god, honey,
we're never gonna make it over this mountain.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
If this is ridiculous, We're gonna die up here.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
No, he didn't listen to that. And when she was
up there and they were dying, and she was like,
I told you so, I should I should have listened
to my mother.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
I should have never married you. You know, it's really
sad too, is if you read about the people who
made it were the men, they all ate their wives
and children. Of course, not all of them, okay, not
all of them, but the ones that were predominant that
actually survived, they did survive off of their family, you know,
eat or be eaten, I mean that's literally what it was.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
I would just do a bunch of gross stuff so
they wouldn't want to eat me.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
What do you think was the first part? I mean
we talked about this before, but you know when somebody
died and they had to give.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Like their legs and their butt, that's like all muscle,
that's your rump, roast your hams.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
Your hambocks, and then like your your legs.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
You think they probably boiled the bones too. Probably get
a good like a bone broth hare's had a lot
of protein in it.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
Yeah, suck the marrow out of a human leg bone.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
God, Happy Valentine's Day, everybody.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Are we done talking about cannibals?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Because yeah, I know I'm gonna strangely enough, I'm ready
for dinner.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
I think I'll probably eat fish tonight.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
I'm gonna have a salad though. They Yeah, Raccoene too.
Speaker 4 (18:03):
My townieros A.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
On our way through Donner Pass, we also have the
opportunity to stop in a town in California called Trucky.
Tucky is actually pronounced what troqu or something. I don't know.
I'm really bad, you know, I'm really bad at trying
to pronounce things, So but you know, somewhere along the
line got changed to Trucky, and it was a Native
American chief who named the area. I'm gonna really mispronounce
(18:31):
the tribe's name, but I think it's Pyote Kyote Chayute
Pyote chief, so Northern Payutes. They were the ones who
inhabited that area. Trucky has a really interesting history because
it is in the mountains. I've been to Trucky, of course,
I've been to Turkey. I lived all over that stated too.
(18:52):
You know what, it doesn't sound very sophisticated that town.
You know, Trucky sounds like it's a place where truckers
go and live.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
I will tell you this, Trucky is a beautiful place,
but it is kind of a place that you just
want to pass through.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
It is a beautiful place.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
And like camping, hiking, skiing is huge for sure, a
place you just want to pass through if you're if
you're trucking.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
The Native American, the chief, he the reason it got
its name that tro K. He came up with that
name for that area, like I mentioned, and it actually
means everything is all right in that language, so that
is so cool. He was saying, Trok Troky as he
was riding by. Of course, this is a very uh
white thing to do. They didn't know what he was saying,
(19:36):
so they just assumed that was his name, Trok truck
so that he was Chief Trucky from from that point on.
Speaker 7 (19:42):
Awesome, yay white people, all right, Like seriously, he must
be saying his name just like, no, idiot, my name
is Philip.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
I'm saying everything is okay, Oh it's bad. Well anyway,
So Trucky began in eighteen sixty three. It's actually a
station along the wagon train or a wagon road or
what is that called sint you a wagon road, so
probably one trail, probably one that the Donner should have
passed through. It is an area where people go to
(20:15):
now get a good view of Lake Tahoe and do
some hikien and camping. Like you mentioned, I.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
Gotta ask, how would you say the name b j
e r k h o e l jerk hole birkle bukle.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
So BJ is often like it's a Scandinavian.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
B j e r k okay bircle birkel.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, you know where I'm from, we got a lot
of BJ's. Really, I guess you have to do something York,
York is a name in my area York.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
Well. Alissa Berkle is a litigation coordinator at the California
Innocence Project.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
She's from Trucky, oh Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Win Butler It's.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
A Canadian American singer, songwriter, musician and multi instrumentalist.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Also lives in True.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
Recki Stacey Cook World Cup Alpine ski racer, Andy Finch snowboarder,
Travis gannag.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
World Cup Alpine ski racer.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
All of these.
Speaker 4 (21:19):
People Trucky, Trucky, Treki, Chaz Goldemond snowboarder, Jeff Hamilton speed
skiing champion nineteen ninety two olympian, who Peter Johnson a
former World Mogul.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
Skiing champion, also the name of my ex husband Rip. Basically,
there's a lot of skiers and snowboarders and famous people
in Trucky. And I will go back to what I
had said previously. Skiing and snowboarding is not for poor people.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
True.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
True that a lift ticket for one day is well
over a hundred buck. Okay, So like this is not
This is not a work in man's hobby. This is
a red person's town. And then the people who worked
for them but some interesting names.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
So truck is also known for something not so cool.
I want to bring this up because it has been
around for a long time, and we talked about in
our last episode the Chinese individuals that came over and
we're working on the railroad, and you know, some unwillingly,
some willingly, for very very low money, they would establish
some community within these areas which they were you know,
(22:28):
working on. So if they were working in a community,
especially them in the mountain mountainous areas, because it was
really it took much longer to build a railroad in
a mountainous area, so they would actually establish themselves in
that community. And Trucky happened to be one of the areas,
much like Dutch Flat in our last episode where they
built a China town. Really sadly, in all of northern California,
(22:49):
all the China towns were burnt down by you know,
anti Chinese white people, essentially racist racist. Yes, yes, they
believe that here's a bunch of people who came over
and are working and taking away jobs from the white people.
So these white hate groups came out and burned down
China towns, specifically China. So Trucky rebuilt itself like three
(23:12):
or four times because of this. Addition to that, what
white people did was they boycotted anything that had to
do with Chinese, including all the businesses and any businesses
that supported people who employed Chinese. Basically, they ran them
out of town, purposely got rid of people who were Chinese.
This was called then afterwards, because it worked, it was
called the Trucky method. It's a legitimate phrase that people
(23:36):
might use today that basically means to boycott a race. So, yeah,
it's pretty awful, pretty awful. Do you think about what
you know that Native American really was calling, the chief
was really calling the town is everything's all right? But
truth beattled, everything's not alright.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
In Trucky, these races, creeps waited until the majority of
the work had been completed. So they brought people in
first slave labor, let them establish community, and then basically
appropriated all of.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
That and ran them out exactly.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
And what's really awful is that you know, here you
and I are talking about because we're reading up on
these things as we go through towns and find out
their history and find out their beginnings and tell the
stories of what's really happening in these towns. But at
any point in your education did you learn about the
way that we treated people Until we researched and really
(24:27):
looked into this stuff, would you have known that this
kind of these kinds of things were really happening in
the US. I mean, I hate to bring it up,
but our education system is pretty much run here in
the US by our legislature and are the laws state laws,
country laws, and we learn what they want us to learn,
and here we are.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
You know, you know, it's you know, it's really ironic
or yeah, is that they went into Colorado City, you
know here at Arizona and the people who are living
there and they're following the leader of their church who
had made their own textbooks, their own and you know,
the kids were only allowed to learn what they said
(25:06):
was appropriate. They basically recreated everything, you know, American history
to their liking, to what they wanted to do to
the kids. But yes, our government has done the exact
same thing. So yes, growing up, we all, I think
everybody kind of always had that maybe one cool teacher
that was defiant and actually did talk about slavery and
(25:27):
did talk about the ugliness of American history, but it
was still a very short blurb in our education, the
mistreatment of Chinese Americans, of Cuban Americans Puerto Ricans was
not discussed and is still not discussed. And you know,
they made it sound like Chinese Americans ladly came here
(25:50):
because they were so skilled at building railroads that of
course they wanted to be here.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
To help us out.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
And you know that really wasn't the case at all.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
You know, I can't remember even as a child, there
were very racist commercials on television that were just part
of our normal day to day thing. You know. There
was like the only time you would see like a
Chinese American or an Asian American person on television was
if they were doing.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Laundry or running a convenience store.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Those were all Those were all very racist images and
stereotypes that they put in the eyes and heads of
people growing up. Yes, yeah, and then if that's not
counterbalanced with you know, reality and truth taught in school,
what are kids supposed to know?
Speaker 1 (26:35):
They grow up to become an unwitting.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Racist, if you will, Yeah, they don't even realize they're
a racist.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
Yep, it's very true. It's not an.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Excuse, which is not a dang excuse because by the
time you're an adult, you have to go okay, you know,
like we were wrong about so much, Like why don't
we just keep our mouths shut and learn some more.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Yeah, it's just it's gross. It is you have to unlearn.
That's the tough part is like, you know, if kids
growing up were taught what really happened, educated in the
you know, we don't want to hide just because people
if some people believe it was true, some people believe
it wasn't true, some people believe that it's an agenda
from a party. It's just ridiculous it happened. You know,
(27:17):
how do we learn, Like every single person in the
whole world learns by mistake and are our parents' mistakes
and or other people's mistakes. So it is important for
kids to see that, hey, this is what happened, and
it was a mistake, because that's how we're going to
learn not to do that in the future. And that's
(27:37):
not what's happening because people are not talking about it.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
But that's there's a reason.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
For that though, Jessica. And it's like, okay, so we talked.
Last year, we talked and it is Black History Month.
We had a lot of really awesome broadcasts.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
On Yeah, please check them out. Check them out.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
And we talked then about how very heartbreaking it is
to learn true American history and how that can also
make people feel a lot of shame regret even you know,
and I've heard people say I wasn't alive then, yes,
but you know, we do feel shame and regret and
(28:17):
heartbreak for our history and our ancestors and the things
that happen, and we have to feel that You're right.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
We do learn from.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
Mistakes, but they don't have to be our mistakes right now.
They can be the mistakes of other people, and that's
sometimes the best way to learn.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
But I believe our government.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Does not want people to be educated because if people
are educated, they have an advantage. If people know all
of the disgusting history, they may not repeat those same mistakes,
or they might be less inclined to repeat those same mistakes.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
And if they stop repeating those.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Mistakes, rich white men are not going to always have
the upper hand or advantage in this society. And that's
something they definitely do not want to happen. They do
not want a paradigm shift. They do not want people
who don't look like them to have power or control.
(29:13):
So that's why they prevent education, That's why they don't
want kids to learn.
Speaker 6 (29:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
No, I mean it is a great equalizer, it really is.
And you can see, you know, in other countries how
just how far people can go in education, and the
fact that we are so far behind in most you know,
we're we're all about prestige more than education here in
the US, and our ability to either be on top
(29:40):
of it or have to get funding from somewhere like
our government to be able to go to school is
how they control. It's just how they control everything, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Yeah, get joy from our government to go to school,
learn the things they will allow us to learn. And
then also the ability for certain people to get into
some of the more prestigious universities.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Is just not there.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
The opportunity is just not there.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
It's not there. Yeah, And I mean that's a whole
other subject, of course, it is like it just goes
and just cause.
Speaker 4 (30:12):
It on it.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
But really what we're getting at here is that systematically
we're still in these same places. And while we don't
necessarily we're not necessarily building railroads with Chinese slave labor,
we are, you know, still in a place where we're
not learning about it? We are? You know, if teachers
talk about it, they can get fined, at least here
(30:33):
in Arizona, if teachers talk about certain subjects, they'll actually
get fined all the way up to maybe sued, and
they lose their job and their teaching certificates. So they
have to be very careful not to say anything that
the government wouldn't want you to say, or have a
compare complaint about something that they believe is untrue and
they shouldn't be talking about it. Leaves education really really
(30:53):
looking sad. You know, allow people to make up their
own minds about a subject, and unfortunately that's the way
it is now.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
That's why I said, you know, we always had that
one teacher that was just you know, the cool hippie
teacher that was, yeah, you know what, I'm gonna teach
these kids, And they usually didn't stay around that long,
especially not in the little towns I grew up in.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Oh, you know, they'd run those freethinking hippies right out
of town.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
You know, they don't want their kids getting learned up,
getting all books smart, especially especially the girls, because I mean,
like how the hell you're gonna find yourself a good
wife if they're all smart.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
The answer is you're not.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Yeah, it's unfortunate. Don't get me fired up because it's
the weekend.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
I don't want to have to croekend.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Well, it's been really fun so far in California. And
even though I mean, if we're anywhere, you know, California
is the place to talk about these things. I definitely
have enjoyed the time we've spent in the very beginning
of the Lincoln Highway going through California. You know, we're
going to be heading out of California this next episode,
(32:03):
and I'm really excited to see where we head to
next over in Nevada.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Yes, Nevada, Nevada where being gamble? What else you well,
a lot of things prosecutions legal there, which I think great.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Yep, ladies of the evening.
Speaker 3 (32:20):
Sex workers they're called now they go hand in hand.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
Right, well, hand in something.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Okay, you had a great hand in something for sure.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Yeah. The old fashioned, the old fashioned, the old fashion,
serve an old fashioned left and right.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Thanks everyone for joining us today in small Town USA.
If you want to hear more small Town subscribe now.
Go ahead. I'll wait. Make sure you check out the
links in the description of this podcast for our Twitter
and Instagram accounts. Don't miss your exit, like, share, and
follow us now.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Now leaving Smalltown USA. Small Town USA is a production
of nineteen Media Group.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
If you would like to feature your small town in
an episode or have suggestion for future shows, follow us
on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter at small Town USA Show.
Thank you for joining us, and come again real soon.
Navigating to small town US A shoe markers. For one,
(00:28):
are we challiet? Hey, Jessica hate carbon? How are you okay?
I think I always say I'm doing okay. I don't
know is there I should probably get to a point
where I say like, great.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thank you, very well, thank you very well, very well. One.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
I don't think people can see it, but my teeth
are batty white and white.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
What are you using?
Speaker 3 (00:56):
I use that optic white color beve.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
It's coldgate.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Dazzling white.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I would say they are dazzling. They're like bright, like
put those in a black light.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
Ooh yeah, how sexy would that be?
Speaker 4 (01:12):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah? I could do a pearl Drops commercial.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Ooh, pearl drops. Do you remember the pearl Drops commercials?
Are you too young?
Speaker 2 (01:22):
No?
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I remember? I mean I know what they are. I
don't remember that the commercial specifically, but I do know
what the pear drops are.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
I wanted the pearl Drops so bad, and then I
got it finally, when I was old enough to buy
my own. My mom would never buy it for me,
and I realized what it is. It's just sandpaper, liquid sand,
liquid sand. Yeah, it's like a minted liquid sand that
you used to upbraid your teeth and take off the
enamel and hopefully underneath this white.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
But in the meantime, lose your enamel. Yeah, it's very
very gritty. It's very gritty.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
And then there was the red colgate. Do you remember that?
Speaker 2 (01:59):
Uh huh yeah, Oh my god, I wanted that's so bad.
That was such a right, ye wasn't that? It was
a beautiful toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Yeah, Jel Redjel almost shimmered a little bit in there.
Oh yeah, Now they have sparkles in it.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Oh my gosh, I love I love a toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yay toothpaste, That's what I said. Yay for toothpaste.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
Yeay for toothpaste.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Where are we hanging enough toothpaste? You might need to
brush your teeth after this episode, because you know, we're
passing through Donnor's Pass on our way through the Lincoln Highway.
And if you've heard of the Donors Pass or Donner's Party,
you have an idea of what happened there. Eight people,
the eight people to survive for the most part, I
(02:43):
think some I don't know.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
It just became fun.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Yeah. So we are again, we're headed down the Lincoln Highway.
We're still in California and Donner's Pass is I think
one of the highest points on the Lincoln Highway and
it was probably the most treacherous. Yeah, so there is
a town called Donner and then obviously Donner's Past and
it was named after the infamous Donner Party. And you know,
(03:07):
we always like to talk about cannibalism on this show.
For some reason, most of our episodes, somehow we fit
it in. I don't know why, but interesting, it is interesting.
But this is probably one of the most famous cases
of cannibalism in the United States. And so let's talk
about you know, Donner was named after the Donner Party,
(03:29):
so prior to that had no had no incorporation. It
really doesn't have any a lot of things going on
there right now except for that it's right next to
like Tahoe, so it's a beautiful area. And same thing
with Trucky. It's right on the top of that like
Tahoe area, and so lots of hiking, lots of that
stuff happening, nature guide skiing.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, so Trucki is actually one of the snowyest places
in America.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Wow, great skiing, great skiing there.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And that gives you an idea of like if it's
one of the snowyest areas in the US, then you
know the point of where the Donner Party came through.
I think there was like eighty one people originally in
the Donner Party headed west towards California. I think did
they start in Missouri.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
I want to say they started in Illinois.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Illinois, Say Illinois. I prefer to say Illinois. So the
history is that if you were moving, if you are
traveling west in what you know, but by horseback, by train,
wagon train basically at this time, that it would take
you months to get through, and so you wanted to
(04:36):
cross the Sierra Nevadas as early as possible. You didn't
want to hit the snowstorms. But you also want to
make sure there's grass for your animals to eat along
the way. So the perfect timing was about leaving in
April late April and being able to get there before
the first snowstorm, get through the mountains before the first snowstorm.
And for some reason the Donner Party left out And
(05:00):
did a cannibal just bite you on my ankle?
Speaker 4 (05:07):
Damn it?
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Oh shit, I just dragged my bone across the wooden chair,
like my ankle bone.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
Well, the Donner Party instead of leaving in April for
some reason, they left mid May. So they were already
a few weeks behind what they should have been, but
they felt like they could make it across still. They
could make up good time because they had received this
possible faster trail that somebody told them about. So they
had this route that went off of their regular map
(05:40):
and that they decided that they were going to take
it to try and make up time. Well, what ended
up happening was that route was bad. It was it
was a fake route, so nobody really traveled on that before,
and it was treacherous. It was bad.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
Other people don't People might not understand about this part
of the United States.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
And also, you know, like parts of in the Rocky.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Mountains in Colorado, and when you're way up high in
the Sierra Nevadas, even in May or June, you can
get trapped in a snowstorm there when you're in that
high of an elevation.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
So people who live in Tucson and Florida would not
understand seeing snow in the summertime. Oh yeah, those snowstorms.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Can hit out of nowhere and they can be dump
a lot of snow. I've lived in this area, and
you know, it can start snowing at night and you
can wake up in the morning and the snow.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Can be up over your doors.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
So it's sort of romantic and fun to think about now,
but not if you're on a horse.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
No, without a heater. And so by the time they
got to the mountains, they hit a snowstorm. They couldn't
get through it. Before the first really really heavy snowstorm hit,
they didn't have much to keep them warm. And not
only that, they had enough provision to get them through
their trips. And so when they get to Donner past
(07:00):
that area, they have to stop and they have to
kind of wade out the snowstorm. And then it just
gets worse and worse from there because they can't move forward.
Their animals certainly can't truck through the deep snow. It
was about November, I want to sackt o November when
they started getting that snowstorm and they started building huts
in different areas. Most of the travelers in the Daarna
(07:22):
party were children, most of them and more it's tender meat. Obviously,
for the first month or so, they run out of provisions. Yeah,
you know, they start eating their animals. I thought, what
are you going to do? What are you going to do?
So cold nothing can grow, They can't like grow new
crops or anything. The only thing you have maybe a
lot of is water at this point, but it's resting.
(07:45):
Yeah that's called ice. Yeah it is snow and ice. Okay.
Then what ended up happening was so they started using
the hides of the animals to kind of that leather
would keep the water from seeping in or the snowstorm
and keep a little bit more warm in their huts.
But they were starting to starve. Out of the eighty
(08:05):
one people that were traveling, fifteen decided to leave and
try to create this rescue mission. Fifteen set out on
foot to get through, and only two of the fifteen
Nadi it across. That was the first time people started
to consider eating is those fifteen individuals, because they literally
went out with nothing and except for trying to make
(08:27):
it took a month for them to get across and
get down to a settlement to start a rescue mission.
And that's that was essential that it happened, so that
people knew they were there, but it was months on
end before they got everybody out, and by that time
the verse fifteen people that went out did resort to
eating each other. So they did start debating on who
(08:50):
was going to die so that they could feed the
other person. Natural death happened, so it ended up not
having to do that. However, there were two Native Americans
their guides through this. They were a part of the
party as well, and the guide started feeling like they're
going to eat us out of the bunch who that
they might actually consider killing, they felt like their lives
(09:12):
were at risk, so they did actually leave. That made
it no, they were not because there was somebody who
decided who ended up murdering them so they did. It
was the only murders, okay, of this whole process.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Who documented their fear. That's what I'd like to know.
How is it documented?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
I'm not exactly sure, except that this is all accounts
so depended on whoever was survived. I guess the survival
because there were fifty one people that survived or fifty
some people that survived out of the eighty one.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Can I just say, there's so many reasons to keep
the secret, like I would definitely not help people.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Yeah, we ate Jim, but the fact that we have
to resort to.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
Cannibalism is one thing.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah, you know, people could have their theories and their speculations.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
We don't ever really have to admit to it.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
We could just be like, oh, he's up there somewhere,
you know, he just died in the snow, and I
keep looking.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
I mean it's a large area.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
They're not gonna, yeah find But I certainly would not
have documented. Yeah, you guys that were trying to help us,
who vocalize that their fear that we were going to
eat them, we actually did kill them and eat them.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Yeah, I don't. It was just recorded that one person
did actually murder for food, like that was the intent.
It wasn't anything else. It was because they were starting.
The rescue then started, but it took months again just
to get to them. By that time, it was like
January February by the time the first people were found.
And then at that point so many people were weak
(10:45):
that they could not bring everybody back with them the
first round, so people were left up there. They didn't
couldn't take any provisions with because it took so long
to get there, and they would take people back as
a small groups at a time until only one person
and was left. So there was the like one person
was left. I think there were a couple people left.
But at the time that they finally got to the
(11:08):
last person up there, he was alone and he was crazy.
He was crazy at that point and he had you know,
everybody had. Anytime somebody passed away from either starving or cold,
they ate them. You know, that was just some that
was kind of like the thing because they needed to survive.
And so anybody who was left that camp probably did
(11:28):
consume human because that was all they could eat at
the time. They did roast, it says in there they
were roasting body parts and eating them and consuming them.
The other thing that they would eat if they didn't
want to resort to eating human, they would take the
hide and tree bark, tree bark and hide and mix
(11:49):
it and consume like in like like a paste or whatever.
That sounds good, kind of like tree jerky.
Speaker 5 (11:57):
Yeah, the very serious question just yeah, let's say on
one of our trips, mm hmm, we found ourselves in
this situation, how long would you wait to try to
eat me?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (12:15):
My god, I would not. I think you know what's
really sad or no, really funny. I guess is that
this is not the first time you've asked me this
question on this podcast. I don't think I would ever.
I don't think I could. I would be walking and
starving myself before I even considered it. I just you know,
I don't know if the circumstance would be different in that,
(12:35):
but just my feeling is that I would like lick
dirt before I would eat human against me, Right, it's not.
It's not a personal thing against you. I'm sure you
take fine, Thank you. So here's another question, pretty serious. Yeah,
let's just say you have made the decision.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Yes, I'm going to eat a person who is the
first person you would eat, like of people I know
or just people anybody in the world.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
I don't even know. That's hard. I don't want to
say I could eat anybody. Who would you eat? Jimmy
Smith's you wouldn't name? Ready, if I had to eat.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
A person, yeah, if you had to be a tall man,
m he's got that big ass.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
So I think people would probably you could think of
it as like, Okay, who do I really dislike? Right? No,
I love No, I'm saying like some people go that way,
I think, and then the person might go, who's going
to sustain me the longest? Yeah, it's going to provide
me with the most for the longest, right, right.
Speaker 2 (13:40):
And I think if you're a really sick o person,
sicker than this conversation, you might consider who's gonna taste best?
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Okay?
Speaker 2 (13:50):
I would think okay, I would think vegetarians probably taste
the best.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
Grasp it or what I mean?
Speaker 2 (13:56):
I think vegetarians would probably taste the best fruits and
vegetables and hold grains.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Sure, very healthy.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
But again, we live in a.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Society where there's food every freaking place. There's no way
we would ever be anywhere where there wasn't food within
a few miles, you know. And even if you crash
a plane and you managed to survive, there's so much
food on a plane. Yeah, right, Like every kid has
a diaper bag filled with goldfish and cheerios.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Right, I would take those. I would take them right away.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Is it inappropriate to just use one of your injured
piers as bait for like a bear.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Or a mountain lion?
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Yeah, so this is what I'm thinking.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
We could sharpen a stick, a big stick, several big
sticks to kill a bear, right, and we could use
the hurt person, like put them out there naked on
a rope, crying like I've seen on TV. And then
when the large animal comes to consume the prey, we
get the animal, and then we.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
All have food. This is simple stuff.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
Yeah, you think the pioneers were on this right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Come on, come on, guys.
Speaker 3 (15:04):
There's elephant stuffs up there.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
I think it was really dumb of them to kill
the guides because yeah, more than likely they're your ticket
to at least the best type of survival you can have.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
So not the first dumb decision they made, no, not.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
So this is what I think should have happened. Okay.
So you get to a point where you've already left
late okay, and before the mountains, you're still in the
plain area. You're maybe in the desert, the warm area. Okay, Yes,
you don't have enough provisions to get you across, and
you kind of know that you're pushing it. You might
run into trouble. So why take the risk with your
(15:42):
entire family comprised of mostly children. Why would you risk
it for the biscuit? Why would you go across? Because uh,
why not just plant and say, like, you know what
this is good enough for this year. Let's try again
next year. Let's just plant our seeds here and then
you know, we go across next season.
Speaker 6 (16:01):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Because the man was in charge, right, and he didn't
want to ask for directions, and he didn't know how
to read a map.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
He got a tip from a local to take another route.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Yeah, and then he yeah, he was gonna make really
good time and so, and he didn't want to listen.
Speaker 6 (16:20):
To his wife who was nagging in the wagon, nagging
in the wagon, saying, oh my god, honey, oh my god, honey,
we're never gonna make it over this mountain.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
If this is ridiculous, We're gonna die up here.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
No, he didn't listen to that. And when she was
up there and they were dying, and she was like,
I told you so, I should I should have listened
to my mother.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
I should have never married you. You know, it's really
sad too, is if you read about the people who
made it were the men, they all ate their wives
and children. Of course, not all of them, okay, not
all of them, but the ones that were predominant that
actually survived, they did survive off of their family, you know,
eat or be eaten, I mean that's literally what it was.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
I would just do a bunch of gross stuff so
they wouldn't want to eat me.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
What do you think was the first part? I mean
we talked about this before, but you know when somebody
died and they had to give.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Like their legs and their butt, that's like all muscle,
that's your rump, roast your hams.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
Your hambocks, and then like your your legs.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
You think they probably boiled the bones too. Probably get
a good like a bone broth hare's had a lot
of protein in it.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
Yeah, suck the marrow out of a human leg bone.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
God, Happy Valentine's Day, everybody.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Are we done talking about cannibals?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
Because yeah, I know I'm gonna strangely enough, I'm ready
for dinner.
Speaker 3 (17:51):
I think I'll probably eat fish tonight.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
I'm gonna have a salad though. They Yeah, Raccoene too.
Speaker 4 (18:03):
My townieros A.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
On our way through Donner Pass, we also have the
opportunity to stop in a town in California called Trucky.
Tucky is actually pronounced what troqu or something. I don't know.
I'm really bad, you know, I'm really bad at trying
to pronounce things, So but you know, somewhere along the
line got changed to Trucky, and it was a Native
American chief who named the area. I'm gonna really mispronounce
(18:31):
the tribe's name, but I think it's Pyote Kyote Chayute
Pyote chief, so Northern Payutes. They were the ones who
inhabited that area. Trucky has a really interesting history because
it is in the mountains. I've been to Trucky, of course,
I've been to Turkey. I lived all over that stated too.
(18:52):
You know what, it doesn't sound very sophisticated that town.
You know, Trucky sounds like it's a place where truckers
go and live.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
I will tell you this, Trucky is a beautiful place,
but it is kind of a place that you just
want to pass through.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
It is a beautiful place.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
And like camping, hiking, skiing is huge for sure, a
place you just want to pass through if you're if
you're trucking.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
The Native American, the chief, he the reason it got
its name that tro K. He came up with that
name for that area, like I mentioned, and it actually
means everything is all right in that language, so that
is so cool. He was saying, Trok Troky as he
was riding by. Of course, this is a very uh
white thing to do. They didn't know what he was saying,
(19:36):
so they just assumed that was his name, Trok truck
so that he was Chief Trucky from from that point on.
Speaker 7 (19:42):
Awesome, yay white people, all right, Like seriously, he must
be saying his name just like, no, idiot, my name
is Philip.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
I'm saying everything is okay, Oh it's bad. Well anyway,
So Trucky began in eighteen sixty three. It's actually a
station along the wagon train or a wagon road or
what is that called sint you a wagon road, so
probably one trail, probably one that the Donner should have
passed through. It is an area where people go to
(20:15):
now get a good view of Lake Tahoe and do
some hikien and camping. Like you mentioned, I.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
Gotta ask, how would you say the name b j
e r k h o e l jerk hole birkle bukle.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
So BJ is often like it's a Scandinavian.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
B j e r k okay bircle birkel.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, you know where I'm from, we got a lot
of BJ's. Really, I guess you have to do something York,
York is a name in my area York.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
Well. Alissa Berkle is a litigation coordinator at the California
Innocence Project.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
She's from Trucky, oh Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Win Butler It's.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
A Canadian American singer, songwriter, musician and multi instrumentalist.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
Also lives in True.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
Recki Stacey Cook World Cup Alpine ski racer, Andy Finch snowboarder,
Travis gannag.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
World Cup Alpine ski racer.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
All of these.
Speaker 4 (21:19):
People Trucky, Trucky, Treki, Chaz Goldemond snowboarder, Jeff Hamilton speed
skiing champion nineteen ninety two olympian, who Peter Johnson a
former World Mogul.
Speaker 2 (21:34):
Skiing champion, also the name of my ex husband Rip. Basically,
there's a lot of skiers and snowboarders and famous people
in Trucky. And I will go back to what I
had said previously. Skiing and snowboarding is not for poor people.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
True.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
True that a lift ticket for one day is well
over a hundred buck. Okay, So like this is not
This is not a work in man's hobby. This is
a red person's town. And then the people who worked
for them but some interesting names.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
So truck is also known for something not so cool.
I want to bring this up because it has been
around for a long time, and we talked about in
our last episode the Chinese individuals that came over and
we're working on the railroad, and you know, some unwillingly,
some willingly, for very very low money, they would establish
some community within these areas which they were you know,
(22:28):
working on. So if they were working in a community,
especially them in the mountain mountainous areas, because it was
really it took much longer to build a railroad in
a mountainous area, so they would actually establish themselves in
that community. And Trucky happened to be one of the areas,
much like Dutch Flat in our last episode where they
built a China town. Really sadly, in all of northern California,
(22:49):
all the China towns were burnt down by you know,
anti Chinese white people, essentially racist racist. Yes, yes, they
believe that here's a bunch of people who came over
and are working and taking away jobs from the white people.
So these white hate groups came out and burned down
China towns, specifically China. So Trucky rebuilt itself like three
(23:12):
or four times because of this. Addition to that, what
white people did was they boycotted anything that had to
do with Chinese, including all the businesses and any businesses
that supported people who employed Chinese. Basically, they ran them
out of town, purposely got rid of people who were Chinese.
This was called then afterwards, because it worked, it was
called the Trucky method. It's a legitimate phrase that people
(23:36):
might use today that basically means to boycott a race. So, yeah,
it's pretty awful, pretty awful. Do you think about what
you know that Native American really was calling, the chief
was really calling the town is everything's all right? But
truth beattled, everything's not alright.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
In Trucky, these races, creeps waited until the majority of
the work had been completed. So they brought people in
first slave labor, let them establish community, and then basically
appropriated all of.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
That and ran them out exactly.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
And what's really awful is that you know, here you
and I are talking about because we're reading up on
these things as we go through towns and find out
their history and find out their beginnings and tell the
stories of what's really happening in these towns. But at
any point in your education did you learn about the
way that we treated people Until we researched and really
(24:27):
looked into this stuff, would you have known that this
kind of these kinds of things were really happening in
the US. I mean, I hate to bring it up,
but our education system is pretty much run here in
the US by our legislature and are the laws state laws,
country laws, and we learn what they want us to learn,
and here we are.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
You know, you know, it's you know, it's really ironic
or yeah, is that they went into Colorado City, you
know here at Arizona and the people who are living
there and they're following the leader of their church who
had made their own textbooks, their own and you know,
the kids were only allowed to learn what they said
(25:06):
was appropriate. They basically recreated everything, you know, American history
to their liking, to what they wanted to do to
the kids. But yes, our government has done the exact
same thing. So yes, growing up, we all, I think
everybody kind of always had that maybe one cool teacher
that was defiant and actually did talk about slavery and
(25:27):
did talk about the ugliness of American history, but it
was still a very short blurb in our education, the
mistreatment of Chinese Americans, of Cuban Americans Puerto Ricans was
not discussed and is still not discussed. And you know,
they made it sound like Chinese Americans ladly came here
(25:50):
because they were so skilled at building railroads that of
course they wanted to be here.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
To help us out.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
And you know that really wasn't the case at all.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
You know, I can't remember even as a child, there
were very racist commercials on television that were just part
of our normal day to day thing. You know. There
was like the only time you would see like a
Chinese American or an Asian American person on television was
if they were doing.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Laundry or running a convenience store.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Those were all Those were all very racist images and
stereotypes that they put in the eyes and heads of
people growing up. Yes, yeah, and then if that's not
counterbalanced with you know, reality and truth taught in school,
what are kids supposed to know?
Speaker 1 (26:35):
They grow up to become an unwitting.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Racist, if you will, Yeah, they don't even realize they're
a racist.
Speaker 1 (26:43):
Yep, it's very true. It's not an.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Excuse, which is not a dang excuse because by the
time you're an adult, you have to go okay, you know,
like we were wrong about so much, Like why don't
we just keep our mouths shut and learn some more.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Yeah, it's just it's gross. It is you have to unlearn.
That's the tough part is like, you know, if kids
growing up were taught what really happened, educated in the
you know, we don't want to hide just because people
if some people believe it was true, some people believe
it wasn't true, some people believe that it's an agenda
from a party. It's just ridiculous it happened. You know,
(27:17):
how do we learn, Like every single person in the
whole world learns by mistake and are our parents' mistakes
and or other people's mistakes. So it is important for
kids to see that, hey, this is what happened, and
it was a mistake, because that's how we're going to
learn not to do that in the future. And that's
(27:37):
not what's happening because people are not talking about it.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
But that's there's a reason.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
For that though, Jessica. And it's like, okay, so we talked.
Last year, we talked and it is Black History Month.
We had a lot of really awesome broadcasts.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
On Yeah, please check them out. Check them out.
Speaker 2 (27:54):
And we talked then about how very heartbreaking it is
to learn true American history and how that can also
make people feel a lot of shame regret even you know,
and I've heard people say I wasn't alive then, yes,
but you know, we do feel shame and regret and
(28:17):
heartbreak for our history and our ancestors and the things
that happen, and we have to feel that You're right.
Speaker 3 (28:23):
We do learn from.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
Mistakes, but they don't have to be our mistakes right now.
They can be the mistakes of other people, and that's
sometimes the best way to learn.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
But I believe our government.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Does not want people to be educated because if people
are educated, they have an advantage. If people know all
of the disgusting history, they may not repeat those same mistakes,
or they might be less inclined to repeat those same mistakes.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
And if they stop repeating those.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Mistakes, rich white men are not going to always have
the upper hand or advantage in this society. And that's
something they definitely do not want to happen. They do
not want a paradigm shift. They do not want people
who don't look like them to have power or control.
(29:13):
So that's why they prevent education, That's why they don't
want kids to learn.
Speaker 6 (29:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
No, I mean it is a great equalizer, it really is.
And you can see, you know, in other countries how
just how far people can go in education, and the
fact that we are so far behind in most you know,
we're we're all about prestige more than education here in
the US, and our ability to either be on top
(29:40):
of it or have to get funding from somewhere like
our government to be able to go to school is
how they control. It's just how they control everything, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
Yeah, get joy from our government to go to school,
learn the things they will allow us to learn. And
then also the ability for certain people to get into
some of the more prestigious universities.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Is just not there.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
The opportunity is just not there.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
It's not there. Yeah, And I mean that's a whole
other subject, of course, it is like it just goes
and just cause.
Speaker 4 (30:12):
It on it.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
But really what we're getting at here is that systematically
we're still in these same places. And while we don't
necessarily we're not necessarily building railroads with Chinese slave labor,
we are, you know, still in a place where we're
not learning about it? We are? You know, if teachers
talk about it, they can get fined, at least here
(30:33):
in Arizona, if teachers talk about certain subjects, they'll actually
get fined all the way up to maybe sued, and
they lose their job and their teaching certificates. So they
have to be very careful not to say anything that
the government wouldn't want you to say, or have a
compare complaint about something that they believe is untrue and
they shouldn't be talking about it. Leaves education really really
(30:53):
looking sad. You know, allow people to make up their
own minds about a subject, and unfortunately that's the way
it is now.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
That's why I said, you know, we always had that
one teacher that was just you know, the cool hippie
teacher that was, yeah, you know what, I'm gonna teach
these kids, And they usually didn't stay around that long,
especially not in the little towns I grew up in.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Oh, you know, they'd run those freethinking hippies right out
of town.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
You know, they don't want their kids getting learned up,
getting all books smart, especially especially the girls, because I mean,
like how the hell you're gonna find yourself a good
wife if they're all smart.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
The answer is you're not.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Yeah, it's unfortunate. Don't get me fired up because it's
the weekend.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
I don't want to have to croekend.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Well, it's been really fun so far in California. And
even though I mean, if we're anywhere, you know, California
is the place to talk about these things. I definitely
have enjoyed the time we've spent in the very beginning
of the Lincoln Highway going through California. You know, we're
going to be heading out of California this next episode,
(32:03):
and I'm really excited to see where we head to
next over in Nevada.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Yes, Nevada, Nevada where being gamble? What else you well,
a lot of things prosecutions legal there, which I think great.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Yep, ladies of the evening.
Speaker 3 (32:20):
Sex workers they're called now they go hand in hand.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
Right, well, hand in something.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Okay, you had a great hand in something for sure.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Yeah. The old fashioned, the old fashioned, the old fashion,
serve an old fashioned left and right.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Thanks everyone for joining us today in small Town USA.
If you want to hear more small Town subscribe now.
Go ahead. I'll wait. Make sure you check out the
links in the description of this podcast for our Twitter
and Instagram accounts. Don't miss your exit, like, share, and
follow us now.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Now leaving Smalltown USA. Small Town USA is a production
of nineteen Media Group.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
If you would like to feature your small town in
an episode or have suggestion for future shows, follow us
on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter at small Town USA Show.
Thank you for joining us, and come again real soon.
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