The Original Iron Mike

Michael Malloy was an unlikely superhero. And, maybe he didn't use his powers to better society. Alright, he really, really didn't use his powers for good. 

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
I think everyone has wondered at onepoint or another what it would be like
to have superpowers. We can allprobably agree that it would be great.
I mean, think of how mucheasier and more interesting your days would be
if you had some sort of superhumanability to help you out. Super Speed
could shorten my commute to work,invisibility could let me slip away from awkward

(00:21):
social interactions, and super strength wouldmake just about every task more manageable.
It's great to see the hopeful possibilities, but do we ever really stop to
think about it realistically. My nameis Josh and this is obscure History.
Make sure you stick around till theend of this episode. I've got a
lot of exciting updates. It's goodto be back where everyone loves superheroes iconic

(01:00):
part of Western society. It's hardto imagine what pop culture might be without
the influence of characters like Batman,Spider Man, Wonder Woman, and about
a million others. With superheroes takingup so much space in our culture,
it's natural for people to speculate aboutwhat kinds of powers they would like or
how they might use them. Thankfullyfor us, trans Impact, a transportation

(01:23):
logistics firm conducted a surprisingly robust surveyon this very subject. They asked over
three thousand people from the United States, if you could have a superpower,
which one would you want. Theresults are surprisingly homogeneous. For about half
the states, the answer was theability to heal others, and for the

(01:45):
other half, the answer was teleportation. In fact, those two were so
popular that there isn't even another oneon the list. What I found even
more interesting about this survey was thesections that explored the respondent's perceptions of super
power. Most people said that ifthey suddenly got a superpower, it would
cause them to change their jobs.About sixty percent of the people surveyed said

(02:08):
that they would rather have a superpowerthan a million dollars, and shockingly,
over twenty percent of men surveyed saidthey would give up their first born child
for the chance to get a specialability. However, that's not what I
found most interesting. The survey hada section that asked respondents how they would

(02:28):
use their superpowers, and this iswhere we get our most realistic glimpse of
what life with a superpower might belike. The survey concluded that three fifths
of the respondents would use their newfoundpowers exclusively for their own gain, rather
than the betterment of society. Italso noted that around fifty percent of gen

(02:51):
Z and forty percent of millennial respondentswould not have any problems with using their
powers maliciously if it meant that theywould experience personal gain. Call me a
pessimist, but that seems right.It seems that generally speaking, people can't
really be trusted to be kind andvirtuous. Certainly there are those who are,

(03:13):
but if presented with the opportunity,it appears that most people would use
their powers selfishly or maybe even unethically. Perhaps you're wondering why we have spent
so much time talking about superpowers ona show that is about history. Well,
I think I may have found areal life superhero, and unfortunately he
did not use his powers for thebetterment of mankind. Not much is known

(03:39):
about Michael Malloy's childhood. Some reportssuggest that he was born sometime in the
eighteen seventies in Donegal County, Ireland, and that's it. His name appears
in New York City in the earlynineteen twenties working as a firefighter, and
even that detail is somewhat unclear.We're really not exactly sure where or for

(03:59):
how long he was a firefighter.Strangely, we start to learn a lot
about Michael molloy once he's hit rockbottom. By nineteen thirty he was a
regular at Marino's speakeasy. He wasa homeless alcoholic with a reputation for running
up bar tabs and leaving them unpaid. Normally, this kind of behavior would
give someone a certain reputation, thekind that might keep you out of bars

(04:25):
and pubs. But Marino's Speakeasy wasn'tlike most. You see, Michael Malloy
was exactly the kind of customer TonyMarino was looking for. Running a speakeasy
wasn't the kind of job that anupstanding citizen would find themselves in. During
the Prohibition, selling alcohol was highlyillegal, so generally people who ran venues

(04:46):
that served it were not trustworthy bynature. In addition to selling illegal alcohol,
Tony Marino and his friend Francis Pasquahad engaged in a bit of fraud,
but not your typical mis representing yourtaxes kind of fraud, something much
more sinister and elaborate. In nineteenthirty one, a woman named Mabel Carson

(05:09):
began frequenting Marino's speakeasy. She hada habit for binge drinking and often passed
out on the floor of the bar. After weeks and weeks of this behavior
and never paying her tab, Marinoand Pascua got an idea. The two
put together a stack of paperwork andtold Carson that Tony Marino was running for

(05:30):
local office. Naturally, when theyasked her to sign the papers, she
did. These men had welcomed herinto their speakeasy, offered her unlimited drinks,
and hadn't chased her away when hertab got too large. To Mabel
Carson, signing the papers to nominateTony Marino for local office only made sense.
However, that's not what she signed. Marino and Pascua had used a

(05:54):
shady insurance agent to take out multiplelife insurance policies on Mabel Carson and tricked
her into signing them. According tothe paperwork, Tony Marino and Francis Pasqua
were the beneficiaries of her life insuranceclaims, and you'll never believe the coincidence.
Shortly after signing the papers, MabelCarson was found dead after drinking herself

(06:15):
into a coma and being left torot in the cold. Because she was
a drifter, her death was notmourned, and because their names were on
the policy, Marino and Pasqua werea few hundred dollars wealthier. Only a
year later, in nineteen thirty two, Michael malloy began frequenting Marinos and sensing

(06:36):
the opportunity for another quick payday,Marino, Pasqua and several of their friends
sought to run the same gambit.However, things this time would not go
according to plan. But before weget to these shocking and troubling details of
this story, we need to payour own bills. We'll be back in
about one minute, so hang tightand maybe hold off on that drink for

(06:59):
a while. Michael molloy was amess. He wore ragged clothes, Dirt
and grime covered the parts of hisface that weren't already covered by wiry and
unkempt hair. To most, hesmelt of booze and body odour, But
to Tony Marino, he smelled likean easy payday. With the help of

(07:21):
his friend Francis Pasqua, Marino wentabout his familiar game plan. He found
a crooked insurance agent to create somefraudulent policies in Malloy's name. He tricked
Maloy into signing them, and thengave molloy access to an endless supply of
alcohol, hoping that the poor homelessman would drink himself to death in his

(07:44):
bar. This, however, provedto be a costly and ineffective plan,
where Mabel Carson had indeed drunk herselfto death, leaving life insurance money behind.
For Marino, Michael molloy just keptdrinking. In fact, he would
drink so hard that he would fallunconscious to the floor, breathing shallow,

(08:07):
body stiff for minutes on end.On more than one occasion, Marino and
his accomplices thought that they may haveachieved their goals, only to watch in
horror as Michael mlloy sparked back tolife, only to ask for another round.
After growing impatient with the plan,Marino began giving Molloy shots spiked with
pure wood alcohol, obviously expecting Moloyto die a quick and painful death.

(08:33):
Marino watched dumbfounded as the homeless mandown shot after shot laced with wood alcohol.
This went on for so long thatMarino began giving him shots of straight
wood alcohol, to which molloy woulddrink completely unfazed. This continued for days
on end. As you can imagine, owning a bar and giving a raging

(08:58):
alcoholic unlimited acta access to your inventoryis not a profitable business model. And
on top of those expenses, Marinowas paying a monthly premium on the shady
life insurance policies. Before long TonyMarino realized that in order to stay in
business at all, molloy would haveto accidentally die a lot more quickly,
and this is when things started toget much, much worse for Michael malloy.

(09:24):
Soon, those shots of wood alcoholalso contained carpet tax and other pieces
of rusty shrapnel. When those didn'twork, Pasqua got creative and suggested that
they serve him raw oysters. Whenmolloy graciously accepted the snack and continued without
issue, Marino, Pasqua and theirother low life friends got a bit more

(09:46):
aggressive. One night, after drinkingrounds of straight wood alcohol, eating raw
seafood and also pieces of literal metal, Michael mlloy passed out on the floor
of the speakeasy. Once his bodywas limp and his breathing shallow, the
men picked malloy up carried him outside, ripped his shirt from his body,
and poured five gallons of water onhim. They went back to the bar

(10:07):
clothes shop, went home, andhoped that the frigid February air would kill
the man. To their severe dismay, Michael mlloy was found the next day
in the basement of the bar afterwaking up in the snow and begging a
neighbor to let him into the building. When Tony Marino and Francis Pasqua went

(10:33):
to open the speakeasy for the day, Michael mLOY simply complained of a wee
cold and asked that they pour hima drink to thaw him out. At
this point, Marino and Pasqual hadspent several months trying to kill Michael molloy.
The booze and the money were runningdry in the speakeasy, and the
men were getting desperate. One night, shortly after attempting to freeze the poor

(10:54):
man, Marino hired another shady friend, Hershey Green, to run Michael mulloy
with his taxicab, and that's exactlywhat happened. After leaving the speakeasy,
a stumbling Michael malloy was struck bya taxicab speeding at nearly fifty miles per
hour. His body struck the hood, flew over the top, and landed

(11:15):
with a thud on the pavement behindthe vehicle. Green even put the car
in reverse and ran over malloy's nearlylifeless body, just to ensure that he
would die. To Marino's great relief, the homeless man didn't come to the
bar the next day, or theday after that, or the day after
that. It seemed that once andfor all, he might actually be dead.

(11:41):
But Marino in Pasqua's celebration was shortlived. They realized fairly quickly that
without a body and death certificate,they would not claim their life insurance policies.
So Marino and his gang began callingevery hospital, homeless shelter, and
morgue in the area, claiming thatthey were in search of their lost brother.

(12:01):
They were unable to locate Michael mlloyor his dead body. Assuming that
their efforts had been a grossly unprofitablemistake, they went about their business trying
to recoup the losses however and whereverthey could. That is until about three
weeks after the hit and run,when Michael mlloy limped into Marino's speakeasy,

(12:22):
sat at his bar, and askedfor the usual. The men were in
shock. It was as if theywere staring at a ghost. They served
him what he asked for and learnedthat he had been in the hospital waiting
for his broken bones to mend.They drank and talked and drank and talked
for hours, that is until Michaelmlloy blacked out for the final time.

(12:46):
Once he was incapacitated, Marino,Pasqua and Red Murphy took his body,
put a hose in his mouth,attached to the other end to a natural
gas line, and opened the valve. The indestructible Michael molloy died within an
hour. Francis Pasqua, conveniently anundertaker by trade, ensured that the body

(13:13):
was buried immediately. Death certificates weremade listing the cause of death as pneumonia,
and although two of the life insurancepolicies had expired, the men were
still able to collect one am easilyfive hundred dollars for all of their troubles.
And perhaps it was at this pointthat they felt safe, maybe even
a little bit relieved. After all, this was a scheme that was supposed

(13:37):
to take a couple of weeks,and here they were months later, having
lost tons of money, brought severalpeople into their crimes, and all with
very little to show for it.Those feelings did not last for long.
Michael Molloy was so well known forhis indestructible body and horrible habits that when

(13:58):
Iron Mike Molloy, they stopped showingup around town. The police noticed,
and they started investigating. They knewthat Molloy's favorite watering hole was Marino's Speakeasy,
and as soon as the police startedasking questions, Marino's house of cards
began to tumble. It was toomessy. Marino and Pasqua brought too many

(14:20):
people into the scheme. One accompliceflipped on another, and they flipped on
another, until the police had enoughevidence to convict five men, Tony Marino,
Joseph red Murphy, Francis Pasqua,Hershey Greene, and Daniel Kryzberg.
The press ran away with the storytoo. Headlines dubbed it the most fantastical

(14:41):
murder in New York, and themen were called the Murder Trust. They
were apprehended, the speakeasy closed,their bales set at ten thousand dollars each
and eventually, after a short trial, each man was sentenced. After a
short day in prison, each asidefrom Hershey Green, were sentenced to death

(15:05):
by electric chair, which killed themon its first attempt. It seems that
Michael malloy had a superpower. Hewas indestructible. Maybe he was lucky,
maybe it was a curse. Whoknows, But I think the most interesting
thing about his stories not how muchpunishment he could endure or how the criminals

(15:26):
kept failing in such outlandish ways.To me, the most interesting thing about
this story is how Iron Mike wasso enraptured by his addiction that despite being
left in the cold, blacking outon the floor of a speakeasy, being
beaten struck by a car, andmuch worse, he always returned to it
begging for more. Thank you somuch for listening. I am completely shocked

(15:58):
and amazed and humbled and thankful that, even while I have not been producing
episodes, thousands of people still listento this show a month, or at
least some people listen to this showthousands of times per month. It's unreal
to me, and I'm grateful thatI have any audience to come back to
at all. Hopefully this finds youwell, and I've got some explaining to

(16:22):
do and some announcements to make.I'm not sure that I ever really fully
explained why I stopped making the showin the first place. So if this
is your first episode or your firstepisode in a while, just know that
I took a very long, almosttwo year hiatus from making this show for
the following reasons, and because I'ma teacher, and because I'm sure that

(16:47):
many of my students know that thisshow exists and suspect that I probably make
it. I do need to besomewhat vague about some of these details.
So I stopped making this show acouple of years ago. My wife and
I got COVID, our baby daughterwas born, and then I started my
master's degree program, and all ofthose things happening, I think maybe at

(17:11):
the same time, revealed that thethe anxiety problems that I have been having
probably my whole life, have athreshold, and I found it and started
having some pretty serious panic attacks.And the show was the easiest and least
essential part of my life that Icould cut out just to save my own

(17:33):
sanity, and so I did,and I probably could have had more of
an explanation at the time, butit just seemed like I needed a full
cold turkey break, and so that'swhat I did, and I didn't open
my social media's. I left manypeople unresponded to in my inboxes, which,
if you're listening and that's you,I'm very sorry. Sometimes drastic times

(17:59):
call for drastic measures. I supposenow positive news. Positive news is I
am like two hours of paperwork awayfrom having my master's degree, so that
huge weight is coming off of myshoulders very soon. I'm a lot more
comfortable in my job and I'm notas stressed about it, which all helps.

(18:21):
My wife and I are having anotherbaby, daughter very soon, and
so I will have that. ButI think without the weight of the master's
degree and trying to learn how todo my job, I should be able
to balance all the things, hopefullygracefully. Obscure history is back in some
way. I'm not sure if itwill be every week or every other week.

(18:42):
I think it just depends. Idon't want to jump into the deep
end too fast and then find myselfin the same predicament where I have to
cut it out of my life again. That's not the goal. The goal
is to continue to bring you newepisodes of Obscure History. I'm writing them
differently, I'm formatting them for books. I did release one print version of

(19:03):
a dozen or so episodes that youcan find on Amazon. I made it
as cheap as humanly possible, soif you're looking for like a cheap little
stocking stuffer around the next time theholidays come around, I guess it's pretty
small. It's about one hundred pages, six by nine, just mostly episodes
of the show rewritten to be morebookish, I suppose. And also maybe

(19:29):
this is the other exciting announcement.As a part of my job, I
am starting a writing club for highschoolers in my area. And this is
a particularly special pet project for me. I don't think that I've ever talked
about it on the show, butwhen I was in high school, I
was a terrible student and nearly droppedout of high school. Was failing every

(19:52):
single class that I ever took untilmy junior year, when, at probably
the lowest point of my life,my ELA teacher, Missus Johnson, allowed
us to do some creative writing,and I found that despite failing at most
of school, I had some sortof a knack for writing, and I
felt a lot of validation there,and she went so far out of her

(20:12):
way to give me opportunities and tosupport me and turn me on to contests
and different publications, and it really, as you can tell, after her
writing over one hundred episodes of thisshow set my life in a particular direction,
and I'm always thankful to her fortaking that time and investing it in
me. And she is probably thereason why this show exists at all,

(20:37):
because when I was a high schoolerfailing most things, she instilled in me
the belief that if I kept trying, I could be a writer in some
way, and I want to passthat on to others. So for this
club, I would like to putout a print publication, which requires some
funding, and I thought that itwould be a really poet a full circle

(21:00):
way to support my community by usingfunds from my writing to support other aspiring
writers and hopefully give them the sameconfidence that Missus Johnson gave to me so
many years ago. So a portionof the proceeds from the ad revenue and
any sponsorships from this show will goto that. So if you've ever thought
about supporting this show, there's atleast a good cause involved this time.

(21:26):
Anyways, i've got to go.It's late and i need sleep, so
thank you again for listening. You'reall the best. I still don't know
how to end this show.