August 13, 2018 • 37 mins
In 1867 America bought Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million. Some opponents called it "Seward's Folly" after Secretary of State William H. Seward. Turns out it was a pretty great investment.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:09):
Welcome to Mistakes Were Made, apodcast about mistakes made in history, hosted
by a real life middle school historyteacher, me Bobby Smithy. I'm here
today to teach my two friends,Michael Day and I'm not swith your name,
so lest Hey, that's me MichaelDay, I screwed it out,
and Robert Bacon. So far,no mistakes have been made, no mistakes,
(00:31):
No mistakes have been made. Bobby, what are we going? What
are we gonna learn about about?Right tonight? I'm gonna try and give
you guys a little bit of akind of intro quiz here. We'll see
what we how we go here?Um? Okay, So this is this
is a one of the large mistakesin history here, and by large,
I mostly mean by land masks,because we're going to talk about a landmak
(00:54):
particularly large mass of land. Uh. And I wondered if you guys had
any guests if I said mistake andI said massive land, changing hands,
do you have any guesses? Guess? Yeah, yeah, you go for
have one. Yeah, my handwas up first, Mike, Yeah you
got it, you got it.But I have the right answer in al
Faly, mister Bobby, Michael olday is annoying me. Okay, that's
(01:18):
not a thing that can be reported. Oh guys, that's that's my day
job and I can't handle it.My night job. Not a thing.
I will. I will write youboth up and send you the principal that
is, I just didn't have timefor this. Mine is a joke,
and it is a land mass ora continent is really just a really big
charcuterie board, just a big slabof meats and cheeses. Yes, no,
(01:42):
that's that's my joke. I'm stickingwith that joke. Yeah, well,
without any setup, that doesn't makeany sense. And sorry, I
should set up that just so youknow. I think that the ocean is
really just fish soup. I know, we all have beliefs. Yeah,
I don't know. I don't knowhow to combat that. It's like if
(02:04):
somebody said they thought that their feetwere made of cheese. I don't I
don't even know where to go withthat one. Um I would say land
mass. The biggest land mass,which obviously caused a huge mistake, would
be the iceberg from the iceberg thathit the Titanic. Yes, yes you
are. You are warmer with yourcolder guests actually is it about Antarctica and
(02:31):
how we thought it wasn't it wasuncle Arctica, but then it turned out
to be Antarctica. Checking gender onan iceberg is like checking gender on a
bird. It's just really hard.You gotta know what you're doing. Ninety
percent of its genders below the surface. It's very tough to find. No,
no, all right. Uh Soif I said this, uh,
(02:53):
this land area was very, verylarge. It was four hundred and twenty
times the size of Rhode Island.Well, that's just a normal size.
And if I said five hundred andeighty six thousand, four hundred and twelve
square miles, Oh, okay,so okay, it's big. Yeah.
Alaska, Alaska, it would bemy guest it is Alaska. Well done,
(03:16):
well done. What a mistake,Alaska, You're a mistake. Alaska
told you Mom wanted to stop afterHawaii. Yeah, so it was,
it was. The purchase of Alaskawas seen as a mistake at the time
(03:36):
by so Russia sold it to America, And now you know, I would
say it is more seen as amistake that Russia made the sale in the
first place. I have a question, yeah, final question, how come
Russia had Alaska and not Canada.Well, that's a good question. So
when you look when you look ata map of Russia, I mean,
you know, which I do everyday and I pray to the Motherland.
(04:00):
Where As as Sarah Palin said,you know you can you can seal a
Russia from Alaska there, which istrue, on one island in one zone.
We should send her off there forevershe's already there. Yeah, So
I mean, it wasn't not ait wasn't a far jump for them.
So when you know, they kindof discovered there was a new world out
(04:20):
there. People started to explore theWest coast and there were lots of different
groups that kind of sent little placesout there. And basically Russia got there
before any any British Canadians did.They had a couple of very tiny outposts.
Um, you think maybe when theymade the sale in the in eighteen
(04:45):
sixty seven, they think maybe therewere twenty five hundred Russians living there at
the time. So a lot ofa lot of fur traders for salesman.
Um, a lot of different religiousfolks there trying to convert some of the
natives. Uh. And of courseyou know, you know, hundreds and
hundreds of Native peoples that for thispodcast and just did not count, which
(05:09):
was sad, but that it ishonest. Another honest question then that that
was awesome. Thank you so much. I did you enjoy that? Mic?
I did you know? Who knew? I was fascinated that whole time,
But a lot of people knew,but I didn't. I didn't think.
I think the reason in my mindwhy it's always been weird is because
usually when that's the case, theline isn't like a straight line. Usually
(05:30):
it's like a squiggly line that followssome sort of river and all that stuff,
and then all of a sudden,for Alaska, it's like straight line.
How uh yeah, you know,with a lot of those things where
they couldn't kind of decide, youknow, where something was, they just
kind of picked a you know,a line. They mean they picked like,
you know, the forty fifth parallelor you know, but whatever,
thirty seven degrees here or follow thisriver and it was just easier to decide.
(05:56):
Um. Wow, yeah, okay, So so they gave up like
huge chunk just guessing on the parispretty much. Yeah, I mean it
was not considered that valuable a place. In fact, it was really to
relate that they kind of decided theyowned it, right. They just kind
of had a bunch of people there. They started arriving in the seventeen thirties,
just like the initial Europeans from England. Um, they kind of formed
(06:18):
a company and it was you know, an investment thing where they were hoping
to come out And basically it wasmostly slaughtered the sea otters, that was
what they were primarily after. Theirfur was was really sought after. Uh,
and the sea Otters were almost extinctby the eighteen fifties and Russia was
really running out of money. Um. Who who had Russia fought in the
(06:44):
in the mid eighteen fifties. Ohit's Ryu. It was Ryu beat Ryou
after Blanca and yeah they beat Blancain Brazil then they beat uh that girl
from China. I came at youwith all those slaps to be guile.
Get the Indians guy's name. Butyou guys, we have derailed. Oh,
(07:08):
it's way off the tracks. Andthat's my job to keep you guys
on the rails. No, no, just so we doubt like the teacher
knew all the names. So well, Bobby, you're very well first,
so good Bobby, it's so manysubjects. This is you should you should
teach street fighter and street fighter too, Oh I do, Oh yeah,
that would uh no. But butthey were they were at war with a
(07:31):
major power. It was a largeit was a large conflict, but it
was one that's kind of been forgotten, one that is not really dragged out
a bunch. Obviously, many peopledied in it, but it's not one
that holds a lot of weight thesedays. I'll say it's been in the
news recently because Russia recently annexed thisterritory. Prussia is Russia. Prussia isn't
(07:55):
annexing anything anymore, Okay, butRussia just annexed this, believe are we
talking about? Uh, that's whatI'm this is the Crimean War. Uh.
And they were at war with actuallyBritain in the Crimean War. And
who didn't fight Britain can go thatis it's a very shortlist, no one,
(08:18):
No one. Russia picked Britain pickeda fight with that just about everybody
at one point in their history.Fucking And now they act like, oh,
we're so proper fucking yeah, theysay it different though they got an
act. They're always apologizing now thoughI think that comes from having fought so
many people. So sorry, sosorry, and we just lost our one
British subscriber. So at the time, Britain and America are really enemies,
(08:43):
and Britain and Russia are enemies,so it's the old enemy of my enemy
is my friend. And Russia wastrying to um. They were trying to
get rid of their Alaska territory becausethey thought they were going to lose it
to Britain anyway, right, Theythought Britain was going to be invading soon
they had all their Canadian territories.This is like what a football team is
(09:05):
gonna cut a player. But they'relike, oh, we're gonna see if
we could trade them off anyway.Yes, I think I think you nailed
it. I think yeah, yep, yep. It's like the rather they'd
rather America have it than they'd loseit to Brent. They're like, hey,
you know what, I'd rather geta seventh a seventh in return,
a seventh round pick in return forthis guy, just so I know that
he doesn't go to my division rivalexactly because Russia hates the Green Bay Packers.
(09:31):
Yeah, and as they should,as they should Aaron Rodgers is too
good of a man. He is, I can't stop this song is so
good by packing goal cheesehead shut up? All right? So uh the I
(09:58):
know totally be real. Uh.The for Alexander the Second decided to sell
the territory, and he started reachingout through kind of some back channels to
America. Hey, hey, hey, we're going, we're going, We're
going. Hey, look inside mycoat, looking coat? I got some
Alaska my coat? You want some? You got Alaska in there as you
(10:18):
want? Hey, how much ofAlaska you want? We'll just pick a
fucking line randomly and you just slamright up down. That's how we're gonna
do this deal. That. Yeah, put your finger in there, just
point it in there. What amI touching? That's too soft? What
is that? That's the line.That's the line you just made the line?
Right? Were you touched? Idon't like it, but I'll take
it all right? Sorry? Isthat what happened? Is that? How
(10:39):
happened? Is that what happen?Virtually? Word for word? Just it's
weird that we got the transcripts fromback then. No, so they they
reached out, they thought about sellingit. Um. They were also starting
to get concerned not only that Britainwould take over the territory, that America
(11:00):
might eventually, especially because America hadhad a bunch of you know, kind
of really pugnacious wars at this time, and had you know, basically taken
California and you know, most ofthe West coast right from Mexico. The
fastestiny yep, little manifest destiny action, that's what they were worried about.
(11:22):
The younger brother of the sar GrandDuke Constantine, he was a big advocate
of trying to sell this to theUnited States. He really thought that they
would eventually take it over. Nowthe negotiations fell apart because what major event
happened in the United States in theearly eighteen sixties. Michael, you got
(11:43):
this one you tell me about.I know you know this one, guys.
Eighteen sixties intelligence guys. Come on, I know you got this.
Eighteen sixties America Times. It's seventeenseventy six. It's a major event.
Oh, it's a very major event. First, okay, hold on,
hold on, We're just gonna throwup guesses and you tell me right or
(12:03):
wrong. Okay, just rapid fires. America is busy putting up the Statue
of Liberty. Nope, off bymany years. Okay, they they pass.
Okay, Paul Bunyan's digging the GrandCanyon. Yep, that's that's this
time. That's this time. Uhthe uh pass. Okay, we are
(12:28):
connecting the East and West railroads inSaint Louis, Missouri. Hope they connected
in Promontory Point, Utah in eighteensixty nine. But you're close, so
close. I'm in the decade.Yep, you didn't nail the right time
period done, that's it. Okay, it's obviously the the uh, the
(12:48):
the gold Rush of San Francisco sixtynine ers. Yeah, I'll give you
a cloth. It was the firstfirst six flags in the South. They
call it the War of Northern Negression. Civil War. Oh, the Civil
War, that's right. Civil Iforgot about that, and apparently a lot
of people did. But we werethen very yeah, preoccupied, I would
(13:13):
say, yeah, we were busywith killing each other. We were like
two brothers fighting each other. Andwhile a burglar came in, who's the
burglar in your metaphor? Except thisburglars trying to sell us a country exactly.
He's more like a vacuum cleaner salesman. Oh he is, he's a
vacu cleaner salesman. Just wandering andhey, your mom home, you kids,
(13:35):
think she might want to buy alittle bit of a Lashka, Yeah,
except more Russian. Have you seenthis thing? Have you seen how
it works? It sucks very well. Anytime you want to cut us off,
Bobby feel first, Oh I willI'm gonna let this one roll.
I don't want to. So afterthe war was completed, the Russia reached
out again. They were even evenmore financial hardship. They had borrowed a
(13:56):
bunch of ooh, they had borrowedfifteen million pounds of sterling from the Rothchilds.
At first, why why they wererepaying their the Russian crown was repaying
their landowners. It was what theyjust were out of money. They just
were running low and it was adire straits. They really kind of made
a second push at this and theperson they reached out to was money was
(14:22):
the was named William H. Seward. I thought you're gonna say William H.
Macy. That would be a veryso close to being amazing. William
H. Sewart was the Secretary ofState under President Johnson. All right.
So President Johnson took over after Lincolnwas assassinated. He got assassinated right after
(14:43):
being elected to his second term there, and people really hated Johnson, like
to a ridiculous degree. People reallythought he was inept and corrupt and just
tremendously hated on. He was actuallyimpeached, he was not removed from office.
(15:03):
He came within one vote of beingremoved from office, and he did
not. Wow. Yeah, yeah, it was he thinking about the goddamn
House of Cards episode that that musthave been of them getting that like one
last vote to keep him in.Jesus Christ. Yeah, man, John
(15:24):
McCain comes in and goes thumbs down. Yeah, take that healthcare bill.
How old do you think, Johnmccainn is Michael Day. I don't know,
eighty two in this scenario, thought, oh, back, he was
there, yeah, yeah, yeah, in eighteen sixty seven he was,
(15:46):
he was he was yeah, hewas eighteen Yeah, he was eighteen shown.
I'm very good with dates, statesand math. Really your four day
and history. All right, Sothey they finally signed the deal through the
Russian ambassador Russian Minister of the UnitedStates in eighteen sixty seven and the final
(16:07):
purchase price was take a guess forthe whole things, this is four hundred
and twenty times the size of RhodeIsland. This is over five hundred and
fifty thousand square miles. What isyour price, good sir? Six thousand
bitcoin? Oh, it's it's ridiculouslylow. I'm gonna say tens of thousands.
(16:29):
Oh, I'm gonna say it's fivemillion, Bob. Oh No,
I'm gonna say like forty I'm gonnasay like forty thousand, forty thousand and
one, Bob, five thousand.You are you were closest with about going
over at five million? The answeris the answer is seven point two million.
Seven point two million. And that'snot even. And that's not even
(16:52):
even in that day and age.That's not that much. I mean,
point two million was not a joke, but it was only at our GDP
then. Oh god, I can't. I have no idea. Not much
GDP. Now, I don't knowabout twelve trillion in today's dollars. In
today's dollars, it would be aboutone hundred and ten million. Yeah,
it's still a steal. This isthis is referred to as Black Friday.
(17:15):
Right. This is the first BlackFriday. So here's the thing now,
at that I went to downside boarderline forever. At the time, some
people were still in favor of this, you know that, realizing that acquiring
any land was a good idea,um, but many were against it.
It was called a Seward's folly.Haters again, Oh, I have heard
(17:36):
of Seward's folly. It's folly.The other nicknames I think are are a
deeper cut walla wall Russia as inwalruss Well Russia, Seward's ice box,
and my favorite is a Johnson's PolarBear garden. Oh that's great, savage
yep. Oh yeah, for forone hundred and fifty years ago, that
(17:59):
was a a sick burn. Ohman. Back in the day, if
you just like if it was justlike if you said huh to somebody,
that was enough to start a fightor a duel. Yeah, that's they
did not take much. There wasa lot of duel in going on back
then. But there was also likethere's also so much respect, I feel
like, so to all of asudden out of left field, just be
(18:19):
like, how's your Polar Bear garden? To be like, whoa too far,
dude, real hard It would itwould. It's the equivalent of like
making a nine to eleven joke theday after it happened. Wow. See
yeah sure, he was like,you can make all the Johnson jokes you
want, but don't offend my polarbear garden. Anyway, we got de
(18:44):
railed again, Ye, derailed again. That's all right. Um. So
there was a lot of opposition toit at the time. They even delayed
making the payments on it. Theykind of pushed it as far as they
could a couple a couple of yearsbefore they finally paid up um. And
there was actually want to go toomuch into it, but there was a
lot of kind of wheeling and dealingabout paying up um. There's some there's
(19:06):
some suspicion that the uh, theRussians and so timely right, the Russians
bribed American officials to vote. Yeah, yeah, can't happen. I can't
think of any way that should Ibe relevant today? Way hi, Yeah,
But it did finally get approved,I believe, in eighteen sixty nine,
and they right in the middle.Nope, Nope. Every year ending
(19:29):
in a nine was not a goldrush. Jackson has your polar bear rush
burn. They dueled like we payour friends with venmo. Hey, can
you venmo me? It's like thatcasual to them back in the day.
It's like, hey, h duelmate. Yeah, I mean they they
(19:51):
talked each other down a lot,but there was an awful lot of just
duels that that were started. Ifeven if they didn't come to shot,
I didn't. I think your wife'sankle our sub average. You, sir,
have challenged me to a duel.Bring it on, you, pussy.
I will defend my wife's cankle,I mean ankle death, mister.
(20:14):
So I want to read you aquote by someone who was a newspaper editor
who was extremely against the purchase andthought it was a ridiculous. Here.
Do you know his name? Uh, let's see. This is always have
funny names. This is Yep,it's a funny name. This is a
big Seward opponent. Horace Greeley.Horace Greeley. Has anyone ever met a
(20:40):
Horace? No? The last HoraceI remember is from the NBA, Horace
Grant. Oh my god, God, I thought you're gonna do a bit
like I have no Horace in thisrate. Oh so this is what they
said. So what we say weare now burdened with a territory that we
have no population to fill. TheIndians within the present boundaries of the Republic
(21:02):
strained our power to govern Aboriginal peoples. Could it be that we would,
now, with open eyes, seekto add to our difficulties by increasing the
number of such peoples under our nationalcare. The purchase price was small,
the annual charges for administration, civiland military will be yet greater. And
continuing, The New York World saidthat it was a sucked orange. It
(21:23):
contained nothing of value but furbearing animals, and these had been hunted until they
were nearly extinct. Unless gold werefound in the country, much time would
elapse before it would be blessed withprinting presses, methodist chapels, and a
metropolitan police. It is a frozenwilderness foreshadowing. This is foreshadowing, ladies
(21:44):
and gentlemen exactly. So how amovie hasn't been made of this because that
is like the perfect speech that youhave that goes into them discovering gold,
right, and you cut to themmining be like, hey, what's this
shiny stuff on the Yeah, it'slike a huge, comically sized gold rock.
Softball sized gold nuggets everywhere get allthese diamonds off of it, Get
(22:08):
all these diamonds off of it.But we shouldn't take it even if it
were given to us. This isn'tcoal. That's such a horrace thing to
say. You've never you've never beento Alaska. You don't know anything about
Alaska. You're sitting there in NewYork and just just thinking about making stuff
up about Alaska. In the lateeighteen nineties, a gold, of course,
(22:33):
was discovered in the Alaska territory andit ended up being a huge eighteen
ninety nine. Nope, nope,nine, it was eighteen ninety six.
I was trying to get too specificclose enough, but you flipped yep,
yep. You remember how to rateboobies on a calculator? Yeah, yeah,
eight zero zero eight five. That'sit. You're going to the principal's
(22:59):
office worth it? Yeah, forthe only where any other word you could
write there. They of course discoveredgold there, and it paid for itself
many times over with the gold discoveredas well as the oil and natural resources
there. That's kind of I thinka self explanatory. And all the bears
that we got, sweet ton ofbears and eagles yep, glaciers. Yep,
(23:25):
we got Juno, which has aplace to pour a giant cruise ship.
Ye oh that's fun fun Alaska.Fact, while we're here, um,
do you know where we get thename nome Alaska? Yes? No,
it's it was misheard. A kid'smom asked him if he wanted to
go to Alaska. He said,no Alaska. Oh you're actually you're actually
(23:47):
close. Yeah, yeah, itwas just a miss it is it is.
It is actually a mistranslation of amap where someone had written no name
and just no is George were noname. What a dumb dumb Okay,
But even before the territory found gold, it did in fact pay for itself.
(24:11):
The seal fur industry kind of tookoff at that time. Yeah,
again on the backs of hundreds ofthousands of dead seals, but we did
make several million dollars from the territorythere. Oh boy, I thought they
were extinct. I thought they weregoing towards extinction. Extinction. They just
found more. Well, that wasthe otters, and then they changed gears
(24:32):
and went with the slightly less betterfur of the seal. Hey, look
there's a bigger all right club.Look I could word on the no yep
that was that was their species namefor a while, bigger dumber otters.
So I want to take you tothis a kind of interesting scene in the
(24:53):
late eighteen sixty seven. So afterthe announcement has been made in late March
about up the transfer of ownership,the America Senate delegation up to the largest
at the time a town there,Stitka, and they had this big ceremony,
you know where the governor's mansion.The governor's mansion was just a two
story house, which was huge inthis thing, and they took down the
(25:15):
Russian flag and they raised the Americanflag, and then they offered everybody the
choice, which I think is justkind of interesting. They said, all
right, everybody, you can gohome on this ship over here and go
back to Russia, or you canstay and become an American. Just let
us know what you want to do. And they everybody could come outside.
What do you know what, likemost people did. Most people went back
(25:37):
to Russia. They kind of thoughtAmericans were jerks. So this this community
of twenty five hundred people ended updown to just a couple hundred just like
ten years later. Whoa yeah,but some chose it. Some were like,
hey, you know what, thisis a great opportunity to suddenly be
from a different country, and I'lldo it. Okay, okay, or
are you can become a bad arelegally you can sign it and we will
(26:03):
refer to you as a bear.Guys, it's not that bad. I
enjoyed doing it. It's I gottasleep all winter, I gotta climb up
trees. It's pretty I could tipover a house if I want it.
You see that used to be Gary, and now he's a bear. I'm
Barry. Now he's very Now it'svery easy transition. What's what's you signed?
(26:23):
I'm backing away into the woods.Now, don't shoot don't shoot him.
Hey, hey, he's not aseal. I'm not a big demator.
Okay, I'm Mary see later.All right, now you will want
to hide your picnic basket a biggernigga Bascus. Another fun fact here,
(26:48):
Um, so the Russians who areliving there at the time. In nineteenth
century Russia, they were still onthe Julian calendar, which was different than
the America Gregorian calendar. Oh yeah, so in addition, our chants are
better. Yeah, the Gregorian chanceyeah, oh yeah, definitely. Uh
in the uh. In addition tochanging your nationality, you also had to
(27:12):
jump twelve days into the future.Whoa, the Julian calendar was twelve days
behind the Gregorian one. Wow,Well what do I do with all those
appointments? Do I have to stillpay for full rent? Yeah? There's
a lot. I feel like thatwould be much more difficult now, but
back in the day, just belike okay, ye, yeah, what
(27:33):
okay. You get a little madwhen it's February. You're like, I
was only here for twenty eight days. Yeah, you're like that. Imagine
suddenly being twelve days short. Themonths. We need to redo the months?
Yeah, you think should all bethe same, organize them. I
would love it to all be thesame. That'd be fine. What would
wouldn't you have to have one monththen be different to make up? Well,
(27:55):
maybe can go every other. Idon't know. I haven't done the
math. I just don't like whatwe have now. I'm actually I think
we should get like one weirdo monthand have all the ones we regular.
Yeah, and that weird month everybodytwenty seven days it's dead after Christmas anyway,
and all the other ones have thirtylike, whatever you need to do,
guys, figure yeah, yeah,whatever you need to do, all
right, So that the day ofthat that flag lowering in October eighteenth,
(28:18):
eighteen sixty seven was is still actuallycelebrated in Alaska. They it's called Alaska
Day and it's a holiday for stateworkers. They played the Alaskan old national
anthem. It's just berry. It'sgreat because it's like their birthday. Yeah,
(28:38):
it is their birthday. I gotI got one more thing for you
here. I got one more thingfor you here, just because I really
like the not only the mistakes thatwere made, but some of the alternate
realities that may have happened. Andso a uh, something I'd like to
throw out there is imagine if this, if Seward's folly ever went through,
(29:00):
an American never purchased Alaska. Imaginehaving the Cold War in the nineteen fifties
with the Alaska territory being Russian.That's scary, right, Yeah, that
that changes the feeling of that alot. Absolutely, they could put missiles
right there, they could have tanksand suddenly and you know, worrying about
(29:21):
some kind of land invasion. Imaginehow bonkers that would have been. And
they'd have all those bears. Yeah, they could send the bears over yeah,
oh yeah, and there. I'msure the Russians would have trained those
bears. Oh sure, Oh withthe little tiny hats and running the tiny
bicycle and the little two twos andthe shaking. Yeah. Don't you don't
need to tell me. You wantto know history on that, I'll tell
(29:41):
you. Oh. Yeah, theywere doing that well before we were,
you know, sending monkeys into space. Yeah, kind of their first with
animals. Yeah. Oh, theirteam was their team did the monkey into
space? The bears taught try tomake rockets to send monkeys into space.
Again, forgive me, I'm fullof useless facts. Do you know that
up until literally a couple of yearsago, Russian cosmonaut equipment still had a
(30:04):
shotgun in it? What why forbears? For when the pod landed off
target. Yeah, and you hadto be alone in the wilderness for a
while till they got you. Itwas god, oh my god. I
don't remember when they stopped that,but it was just a couple I think
it was just like ten years ago. That is like something you see in
(30:25):
Rocky for and you're like, that'sa lie. It's terrifying, but it's
much less terrifying than my initial thought, which was space bears. I became
an astro. No, it lookslike Barry, but I don't know.
Man. No, no, no, no, no. I think I'm
(30:45):
ready to call it. I thinkI'm ready to say mistakes remained? Any
any question, any questions? Doyou guys have anything else? Uh?
Pauling at you? Anything else?That was that all you? That all
you plan to tell us? That'sall I plan to tell you, guys
for this one here, for thisone. Well, we really screwed off,
Mike. We got derailed a bunch. Yeah. I like to bury
(31:06):
a lot. Yeah, and uhhe did just slip in a bear pun
there at the end. But anyany other questions, anything else you're wondering,
anything else going on? Oh?Man, what a mistake. What
a mistake by them, But whata sweet pickup for America. I love
that Seward was looking at for deals. He just had an eye for deal.
He was he was all about Americanexpansionism. He was sweet territory.
(31:32):
That's awesome. I love. That'show you play risk and that's how you
win. Yes, that is AndI just want to point out like you
could, because that that that argumentthat that man made up about, Hey,
America has taken on too much landalready, we can't control what we
have, and now we're going toadd even more, like we're not gonna
be able to control that. It'sgoing to be such a pain. Was
(31:52):
such a convincing argument for not doingit. Wasn't right in the long run.
No, no, very much notright. You know that old adage
about land, you better buy itbecause they're not making any more of it.
Yeah, well not in Hawaii rightnow. No. Yeah, fair
enough with the Chinese islands they're creatingin the Pacific, that's a story.
(32:13):
But let's uh, in general,not too much more is being made.
Yeah. Also, my favorite thingis that we put Alaska on layaway.
Basically we've moved there, we transferredownership, we refused to pay for like
two or three years. Yeah,the American way, that's like that.
There's a lot of a lot ofcomments about being oh he bought Alaska.
(32:35):
It's so cold, it's worthless,coming from people who live in like the
Midwest. All right, what doyou think? What do you think the
North Dakota is? Ah, Thesepeople sitting at lambeau Field judging the Alaska
purchase exactly. It's freezing up there. It is. It just gets to
(32:55):
a point where it's just okay whatever. I think it's beautiful. And Alaska
clock the coldest temperature. Oh really, I want to say, and think
it was. Do you know whatit is? Yes, the temperature dropped
to a record minus eighty degrees fahrenheitat Prospect Creek Camp in nineteen seventy one.
Jesus, Oh that's jelly. Youknow you're in a town. You
(33:19):
know you're in a small town whenit's camp insteadville or town or upgrade maybe
to like a town or no.I like my camps. I'm a camp
boy. I'll always be a campboy, and you're a camp girl.
They're gonna have a Hulu show aboutyou. I mean, well, there's
what. There's nine of us.I feel like that's enough for a village,
(33:42):
no camp, and you're lucky toget that. We used to have
ten, but then Barry went offin the woods. He'll be an astronaut.
I got I got a couple morefacts for you about a last they
round it out here. You've turnedinto Alaska. Fact Alaska. Alaska was
the forty ninth state. Second,Yeah, incorporated in what year? Eighteen
(34:07):
sixty? No, it was likenineteen fifty one. Oh, are really
that late in the game. Yeah, you're closer Mica nineteen fifty nine in
the decade. Again. Holy cow, there's people alive right now who are
listening to this who are like thatguy is an idiot. Yeah, I
mean I was alive. We tendto settle on like fifty states being a
(34:29):
nice round number, but that wasn'talways the case. They were not always
fifty wow. Obviously in my lifetimeeven recently. Yeah. Um so other
Alaska fact here my father's lifetime.During World War two, the Japanese actually
occupied to Alaska Islands. Oh Iknow about that. Yeah, yeah,
for about for a little over ayear, for fifteen months A two and
(34:51):
Kiska. They Alaska has about fivethousand earthquakes every year. Yeah, oh
wow, including the strongest earthquake everrecorded in North America. I guess magnitude
what ten, ten, ten,ten, ten, now ten would be
a couple of kind of bonkers sevenseven point fourteen, no, nine point
(35:13):
two. And it's tough with thethe earthquake scale as well, because the
Richt yeah, yeah, because nineis ten times more powerful than eight.
Yeah, it's been the nine isten to Wow, that is crazy.
I think when I was growing upin La I experienced like we had a
big one when I was there.It was like a six point something.
(35:36):
You could you can feel that one. That's that's that's a sizeable quake.
Oh. When I lived in Taiwanfor a year, we had like an
earthquake a week, and they're likesmaller, but you feel them. And
especially when we lived on like thelike the twenty eighth floor of a building,
so you could feel that thing swayingfor quite some time before it gets
back to normal. That's terrifying.It was awesome. Oh didn't I not
(36:00):
tell you this story? So duringone of the earthquakes, I was walking
into what's called the family mart,which is like a seven eleven, which
is basically what we have here.It's ever like more open and nicer,
I'd say. And I'm walking intothis family mart and a boom, earthquake
happens. Dude behind the cash registerruns out of the building. I like
(36:22):
freeze and like look around it,all the stuff shaking on the shelves,
and I'm like freaked out. I'mlike, oh, it's happening, Like
what do I do? And anold man pushes past me, opens up
the cooler in front of me,and reaches in the vertical coolerythingy with all
the fucking tea's shaken back and forth. I'll joss on around, grabs the
(36:46):
tea, pulls it out, shutsthe door, walks up, and when
he's walking up to the counter,it stops. He walks up to the
counter, sets the tea down,and starts going through his wallet to pull
up the money, and then hewaits for the guy to come back in
and phase for his tea face.I didn't move the entire time. He's
(37:08):
the kind of guy he's not goingto turn around and watch the explosion.
He's gonna he he was just soold. He's like so many I don't
care. Can me my tea andneed my tea? We're different. I
thought you were gonna say he wasgonna steal it. I mean crime is
really low. So we've done mistakesform made I think so mistakes made,
so many mistakes, and not byAmerica this time
Welcome to Mistakes Were Made, apodcast about mistakes made in history, hosted
by a real life middle school historyteacher, me Bobby Smithy. I'm here
today to teach my two friends,Michael Day and I'm not swith your name,
so lest Hey, that's me MichaelDay, I screwed it out,
and Robert Bacon. So far,no mistakes have been made, no mistakes,
(00:31):
No mistakes have been made. Bobby, what are we going? What
are we gonna learn about about?Right tonight? I'm gonna try and give
you guys a little bit of akind of intro quiz here. We'll see
what we how we go here?Um? Okay, So this is this
is a one of the large mistakesin history here, and by large,
I mostly mean by land masks,because we're going to talk about a landmak
(00:54):
particularly large mass of land. Uh. And I wondered if you guys had
any guests if I said mistake andI said massive land, changing hands,
do you have any guesses? Guess? Yeah, yeah, you go for
have one. Yeah, my handwas up first, Mike, Yeah you
got it, you got it.But I have the right answer in al
Faly, mister Bobby, Michael olday is annoying me. Okay, that's
(01:18):
not a thing that can be reported. Oh guys, that's that's my day
job and I can't handle it.My night job. Not a thing.
I will. I will write youboth up and send you the principal that
is, I just didn't have timefor this. Mine is a joke,
and it is a land mass ora continent is really just a really big
charcuterie board, just a big slabof meats and cheeses. Yes, no,
(01:42):
that's that's my joke. I'm stickingwith that joke. Yeah, well,
without any setup, that doesn't makeany sense. And sorry, I
should set up that just so youknow. I think that the ocean is
really just fish soup. I know, we all have beliefs. Yeah,
I don't know. I don't knowhow to combat that. It's like if
(02:04):
somebody said they thought that their feetwere made of cheese. I don't I
don't even know where to go withthat one. Um I would say land
mass. The biggest land mass,which obviously caused a huge mistake, would
be the iceberg from the iceberg thathit the Titanic. Yes, yes you
are. You are warmer with yourcolder guests actually is it about Antarctica and
(02:31):
how we thought it wasn't it wasuncle Arctica, but then it turned out
to be Antarctica. Checking gender onan iceberg is like checking gender on a
bird. It's just really hard.You gotta know what you're doing. Ninety
percent of its genders below the surface. It's very tough to find. No,
no, all right. Uh Soif I said this, uh,
(02:53):
this land area was very, verylarge. It was four hundred and twenty
times the size of Rhode Island.Well, that's just a normal size.
And if I said five hundred andeighty six thousand, four hundred and twelve
square miles, Oh, okay,so okay, it's big. Yeah.
Alaska, Alaska, it would bemy guest it is Alaska. Well done,
(03:16):
well done. What a mistake,Alaska, You're a mistake. Alaska
told you Mom wanted to stop afterHawaii. Yeah, so it was,
it was. The purchase of Alaskawas seen as a mistake at the time
(03:36):
by so Russia sold it to America, And now you know, I would
say it is more seen as amistake that Russia made the sale in the
first place. I have a question, yeah, final question, how come
Russia had Alaska and not Canada.Well, that's a good question. So
when you look when you look ata map of Russia, I mean,
you know, which I do everyday and I pray to the Motherland.
(04:00):
Where As as Sarah Palin said,you know you can you can seal a
Russia from Alaska there, which istrue, on one island in one zone.
We should send her off there forevershe's already there. Yeah, So
I mean, it wasn't not ait wasn't a far jump for them.
So when you know, they kindof discovered there was a new world out
(04:20):
there. People started to explore theWest coast and there were lots of different
groups that kind of sent little placesout there. And basically Russia got there
before any any British Canadians did.They had a couple of very tiny outposts.
Um, you think maybe when theymade the sale in the in eighteen
(04:45):
sixty seven, they think maybe therewere twenty five hundred Russians living there at
the time. So a lot ofa lot of fur traders for salesman.
Um, a lot of different religiousfolks there trying to convert some of the
natives. Uh. And of courseyou know, you know, hundreds and
hundreds of Native peoples that for thispodcast and just did not count, which
(05:09):
was sad, but that it ishonest. Another honest question then that that
was awesome. Thank you so much. I did you enjoy that? Mic?
I did you know? Who knew? I was fascinated that whole time,
But a lot of people knew,but I didn't. I didn't think.
I think the reason in my mindwhy it's always been weird is because
usually when that's the case, theline isn't like a straight line. Usually
(05:30):
it's like a squiggly line that followssome sort of river and all that stuff,
and then all of a sudden,for Alaska, it's like straight line.
How uh yeah, you know,with a lot of those things where
they couldn't kind of decide, youknow, where something was, they just
kind of picked a you know,a line. They mean they picked like,
you know, the forty fifth parallelor you know, but whatever,
thirty seven degrees here or follow thisriver and it was just easier to decide.
(05:56):
Um. Wow, yeah, okay, So so they gave up like
huge chunk just guessing on the parispretty much. Yeah, I mean it
was not considered that valuable a place. In fact, it was really to
relate that they kind of decided theyowned it, right. They just kind
of had a bunch of people there. They started arriving in the seventeen thirties,
just like the initial Europeans from England. Um, they kind of formed
(06:18):
a company and it was you know, an investment thing where they were hoping
to come out And basically it wasmostly slaughtered the sea otters, that was
what they were primarily after. Theirfur was was really sought after. Uh,
and the sea Otters were almost extinctby the eighteen fifties and Russia was
really running out of money. Um. Who who had Russia fought in the
(06:44):
in the mid eighteen fifties. Ohit's Ryu. It was Ryu beat Ryou
after Blanca and yeah they beat Blancain Brazil then they beat uh that girl
from China. I came at youwith all those slaps to be guile.
Get the Indians guy's name. Butyou guys, we have derailed. Oh,
(07:08):
it's way off the tracks. Andthat's my job to keep you guys
on the rails. No, no, just so we doubt like the teacher
knew all the names. So well, Bobby, you're very well first,
so good Bobby, it's so manysubjects. This is you should you should
teach street fighter and street fighter too, Oh I do, Oh yeah,
that would uh no. But butthey were they were at war with a
(07:31):
major power. It was a largeit was a large conflict, but it
was one that's kind of been forgotten, one that is not really dragged out
a bunch. Obviously, many peopledied in it, but it's not one
that holds a lot of weight thesedays. I'll say it's been in the
news recently because Russia recently annexed thisterritory. Prussia is Russia. Prussia isn't
(07:55):
annexing anything anymore, Okay, butRussia just annexed this, believe are we
talking about? Uh, that's whatI'm this is the Crimean War. Uh.
And they were at war with actuallyBritain in the Crimean War. And
who didn't fight Britain can go thatis it's a very shortlist, no one,
(08:18):
No one. Russia picked Britain pickeda fight with that just about everybody
at one point in their history.Fucking And now they act like, oh,
we're so proper fucking yeah, theysay it different though they got an
act. They're always apologizing now thoughI think that comes from having fought so
many people. So sorry, sosorry, and we just lost our one
British subscriber. So at the time, Britain and America are really enemies,
(08:43):
and Britain and Russia are enemies,so it's the old enemy of my enemy
is my friend. And Russia wastrying to um. They were trying to
get rid of their Alaska territory becausethey thought they were going to lose it
to Britain anyway, right, Theythought Britain was going to be invading soon
they had all their Canadian territories.This is like what a football team is
(09:05):
gonna cut a player. But they'relike, oh, we're gonna see if
we could trade them off anyway.Yes, I think I think you nailed
it. I think yeah, yep, yep. It's like the rather they'd
rather America have it than they'd loseit to Brent. They're like, hey,
you know what, I'd rather geta seventh a seventh in return,
a seventh round pick in return forthis guy, just so I know that
he doesn't go to my division rivalexactly because Russia hates the Green Bay Packers.
(09:31):
Yeah, and as they should,as they should Aaron Rodgers is too
good of a man. He is, I can't stop this song is so
good by packing goal cheesehead shut up? All right? So uh the I
(09:58):
know totally be real. Uh.The for Alexander the Second decided to sell
the territory, and he started reachingout through kind of some back channels to
America. Hey, hey, hey, we're going, we're going, We're
going. Hey, look inside mycoat, looking coat? I got some
Alaska my coat? You want some? You got Alaska in there as you
(10:18):
want? Hey, how much ofAlaska you want? We'll just pick a
fucking line randomly and you just slamright up down. That's how we're gonna
do this deal. That. Yeah, put your finger in there, just
point it in there. What amI touching? That's too soft? What
is that? That's the line.That's the line you just made the line?
Right? Were you touched? Idon't like it, but I'll take
it all right? Sorry? Isthat what happened? Is that? How
(10:39):
happened? Is that what happen?Virtually? Word for word? Just it's
weird that we got the transcripts fromback then. No, so they they
reached out, they thought about sellingit. Um. They were also starting
to get concerned not only that Britainwould take over the territory, that America
(11:00):
might eventually, especially because America hadhad a bunch of you know, kind
of really pugnacious wars at this time, and had you know, basically taken
California and you know, most ofthe West coast right from Mexico. The
fastestiny yep, little manifest destiny action, that's what they were worried about.
(11:22):
The younger brother of the sar GrandDuke Constantine, he was a big advocate
of trying to sell this to theUnited States. He really thought that they
would eventually take it over. Nowthe negotiations fell apart because what major event
happened in the United States in theearly eighteen sixties. Michael, you got
(11:43):
this one you tell me about.I know you know this one, guys.
Eighteen sixties intelligence guys. Come on, I know you got this.
Eighteen sixties America Times. It's seventeenseventy six. It's a major event.
Oh, it's a very major event. First, okay, hold on,
hold on, We're just gonna throwup guesses and you tell me right or
(12:03):
wrong. Okay, just rapid fires. America is busy putting up the Statue
of Liberty. Nope, off bymany years. Okay, they they pass.
Okay, Paul Bunyan's digging the GrandCanyon. Yep, that's that's this
time. That's this time. Uhthe uh pass. Okay, we are
(12:28):
connecting the East and West railroads inSaint Louis, Missouri. Hope they connected
in Promontory Point, Utah in eighteensixty nine. But you're close, so
close. I'm in the decade.Yep, you didn't nail the right time
period done, that's it. Okay, it's obviously the the uh, the
(12:48):
the gold Rush of San Francisco sixtynine ers. Yeah, I'll give you
a cloth. It was the firstfirst six flags in the South. They
call it the War of Northern Negression. Civil War. Oh, the Civil
War, that's right. Civil Iforgot about that, and apparently a lot
of people did. But we werethen very yeah, preoccupied, I would
(13:13):
say, yeah, we were busywith killing each other. We were like
two brothers fighting each other. Andwhile a burglar came in, who's the
burglar in your metaphor? Except thisburglars trying to sell us a country exactly.
He's more like a vacuum cleaner salesman. Oh he is, he's a
vacu cleaner salesman. Just wandering andhey, your mom home, you kids,
(13:35):
think she might want to buy alittle bit of a Lashka, Yeah,
except more Russian. Have you seenthis thing? Have you seen how
it works? It sucks very well. Anytime you want to cut us off,
Bobby feel first, Oh I willI'm gonna let this one roll.
I don't want to. So afterthe war was completed, the Russia reached
out again. They were even evenmore financial hardship. They had borrowed a
(13:56):
bunch of ooh, they had borrowedfifteen million pounds of sterling from the Rothchilds.
At first, why why they wererepaying their the Russian crown was repaying
their landowners. It was what theyjust were out of money. They just
were running low and it was adire straits. They really kind of made
a second push at this and theperson they reached out to was money was
(14:22):
the was named William H. Seward. I thought you're gonna say William H.
Macy. That would be a veryso close to being amazing. William
H. Sewart was the Secretary ofState under President Johnson. All right.
So President Johnson took over after Lincolnwas assassinated. He got assassinated right after
(14:43):
being elected to his second term there, and people really hated Johnson, like
to a ridiculous degree. People reallythought he was inept and corrupt and just
tremendously hated on. He was actuallyimpeached, he was not removed from office.
(15:03):
He came within one vote of beingremoved from office, and he did
not. Wow. Yeah, yeah, it was he thinking about the goddamn
House of Cards episode that that musthave been of them getting that like one
last vote to keep him in.Jesus Christ. Yeah, man, John
(15:24):
McCain comes in and goes thumbs down. Yeah, take that healthcare bill.
How old do you think, Johnmccainn is Michael Day. I don't know,
eighty two in this scenario, thought, oh, back, he was
there, yeah, yeah, yeah, in eighteen sixty seven he was,
(15:46):
he was he was yeah, hewas eighteen Yeah, he was eighteen shown.
I'm very good with dates, statesand math. Really your four day
and history. All right, Sothey they finally signed the deal through the
Russian ambassador Russian Minister of the UnitedStates in eighteen sixty seven and the final
(16:07):
purchase price was take a guess forthe whole things, this is four hundred
and twenty times the size of RhodeIsland. This is over five hundred and
fifty thousand square miles. What isyour price, good sir? Six thousand
bitcoin? Oh, it's it's ridiculouslylow. I'm gonna say tens of thousands.
(16:29):
Oh, I'm gonna say it's fivemillion, Bob. Oh No,
I'm gonna say like forty I'm gonnasay like forty thousand, forty thousand and
one, Bob, five thousand.You are you were closest with about going
over at five million? The answeris the answer is seven point two million.
Seven point two million. And that'snot even. And that's not even
(16:52):
even in that day and age.That's not that much. I mean,
point two million was not a joke, but it was only at our GDP
then. Oh god, I can't. I have no idea. Not much
GDP. Now, I don't knowabout twelve trillion in today's dollars. In
today's dollars, it would be aboutone hundred and ten million. Yeah,
it's still a steal. This isthis is referred to as Black Friday.
(17:15):
Right. This is the first BlackFriday. So here's the thing now,
at that I went to downside boarderline forever. At the time, some
people were still in favor of this, you know that, realizing that acquiring
any land was a good idea,um, but many were against it.
It was called a Seward's folly.Haters again, Oh, I have heard
(17:36):
of Seward's folly. It's folly.The other nicknames I think are are a
deeper cut walla wall Russia as inwalruss Well Russia, Seward's ice box,
and my favorite is a Johnson's PolarBear garden. Oh that's great, savage
yep. Oh yeah, for forone hundred and fifty years ago, that
(17:59):
was a a sick burn. Ohman. Back in the day, if
you just like if it was justlike if you said huh to somebody,
that was enough to start a fightor a duel. Yeah, that's they
did not take much. There wasa lot of duel in going on back
then. But there was also likethere's also so much respect, I feel
like, so to all of asudden out of left field, just be
(18:19):
like, how's your Polar Bear garden? To be like, whoa too far,
dude, real hard It would itwould. It's the equivalent of like
making a nine to eleven joke theday after it happened. Wow. See
yeah sure, he was like,you can make all the Johnson jokes you
want, but don't offend my polarbear garden. Anyway, we got de
(18:44):
railed again, Ye, derailed again. That's all right. Um. So
there was a lot of opposition toit at the time. They even delayed
making the payments on it. Theykind of pushed it as far as they
could a couple a couple of yearsbefore they finally paid up um. And
there was actually want to go toomuch into it, but there was a
lot of kind of wheeling and dealingabout paying up um. There's some there's
(19:06):
some suspicion that the uh, theRussians and so timely right, the Russians
bribed American officials to vote. Yeah, yeah, can't happen. I can't
think of any way that should Ibe relevant today? Way hi, Yeah,
But it did finally get approved,I believe, in eighteen sixty nine,
and they right in the middle.Nope, Nope. Every year ending
(19:29):
in a nine was not a goldrush. Jackson has your polar bear rush
burn. They dueled like we payour friends with venmo. Hey, can
you venmo me? It's like thatcasual to them back in the day.
It's like, hey, h duelmate. Yeah, I mean they they
(19:51):
talked each other down a lot,but there was an awful lot of just
duels that that were started. Ifeven if they didn't come to shot,
I didn't. I think your wife'sankle our sub average. You, sir,
have challenged me to a duel.Bring it on, you, pussy.
I will defend my wife's cankle,I mean ankle death, mister.
(20:14):
So I want to read you aquote by someone who was a newspaper editor
who was extremely against the purchase andthought it was a ridiculous. Here.
Do you know his name? Uh, let's see. This is always have
funny names. This is Yep,it's a funny name. This is a
big Seward opponent. Horace Greeley.Horace Greeley. Has anyone ever met a
(20:40):
Horace? No? The last HoraceI remember is from the NBA, Horace
Grant. Oh my god, God, I thought you're gonna do a bit
like I have no Horace in thisrate. Oh so this is what they
said. So what we say weare now burdened with a territory that we
have no population to fill. TheIndians within the present boundaries of the Republic
(21:02):
strained our power to govern Aboriginal peoples. Could it be that we would,
now, with open eyes, seekto add to our difficulties by increasing the
number of such peoples under our nationalcare. The purchase price was small,
the annual charges for administration, civiland military will be yet greater. And
continuing, The New York World saidthat it was a sucked orange. It
(21:23):
contained nothing of value but furbearing animals, and these had been hunted until they
were nearly extinct. Unless gold werefound in the country, much time would
elapse before it would be blessed withprinting presses, methodist chapels, and a
metropolitan police. It is a frozenwilderness foreshadowing. This is foreshadowing, ladies
(21:44):
and gentlemen exactly. So how amovie hasn't been made of this because that
is like the perfect speech that youhave that goes into them discovering gold,
right, and you cut to themmining be like, hey, what's this
shiny stuff on the Yeah, it'slike a huge, comically sized gold rock.
Softball sized gold nuggets everywhere get allthese diamonds off of it, Get
(22:08):
all these diamonds off of it.But we shouldn't take it even if it
were given to us. This isn'tcoal. That's such a horrace thing to
say. You've never you've never beento Alaska. You don't know anything about
Alaska. You're sitting there in NewYork and just just thinking about making stuff
up about Alaska. In the lateeighteen nineties, a gold, of course,
(22:33):
was discovered in the Alaska territory andit ended up being a huge eighteen
ninety nine. Nope, nope,nine, it was eighteen ninety six.
I was trying to get too specificclose enough, but you flipped yep,
yep. You remember how to rateboobies on a calculator? Yeah, yeah,
eight zero zero eight five. That'sit. You're going to the principal's
(22:59):
office worth it? Yeah, forthe only where any other word you could
write there. They of course discoveredgold there, and it paid for itself
many times over with the gold discoveredas well as the oil and natural resources
there. That's kind of I thinka self explanatory. And all the bears
that we got, sweet ton ofbears and eagles yep, glaciers. Yep,
(23:25):
we got Juno, which has aplace to pour a giant cruise ship.
Ye oh that's fun fun Alaska.Fact, while we're here, um,
do you know where we get thename nome Alaska? Yes? No,
it's it was misheard. A kid'smom asked him if he wanted to
go to Alaska. He said,no Alaska. Oh you're actually you're actually
(23:47):
close. Yeah, yeah, itwas just a miss it is it is.
It is actually a mistranslation of amap where someone had written no name
and just no is George were noname. What a dumb dumb Okay,
But even before the territory found gold, it did in fact pay for itself.
(24:11):
The seal fur industry kind of tookoff at that time. Yeah,
again on the backs of hundreds ofthousands of dead seals, but we did
make several million dollars from the territorythere. Oh boy, I thought they
were extinct. I thought they weregoing towards extinction. Extinction. They just
found more. Well, that wasthe otters, and then they changed gears
(24:32):
and went with the slightly less betterfur of the seal. Hey, look
there's a bigger all right club.Look I could word on the no yep
that was that was their species namefor a while, bigger dumber otters.
So I want to take you tothis a kind of interesting scene in the
(24:53):
late eighteen sixty seven. So afterthe announcement has been made in late March
about up the transfer of ownership,the America Senate delegation up to the largest
at the time a town there,Stitka, and they had this big ceremony,
you know where the governor's mansion.The governor's mansion was just a two
story house, which was huge inthis thing, and they took down the
(25:15):
Russian flag and they raised the Americanflag, and then they offered everybody the
choice, which I think is justkind of interesting. They said, all
right, everybody, you can gohome on this ship over here and go
back to Russia, or you canstay and become an American. Just let
us know what you want to do. And they everybody could come outside.
What do you know what, likemost people did. Most people went back
(25:37):
to Russia. They kind of thoughtAmericans were jerks. So this this community
of twenty five hundred people ended updown to just a couple hundred just like
ten years later. Whoa yeah,but some chose it. Some were like,
hey, you know what, thisis a great opportunity to suddenly be
from a different country, and I'lldo it. Okay, okay, or
are you can become a bad arelegally you can sign it and we will
(26:03):
refer to you as a bear.Guys, it's not that bad. I
enjoyed doing it. It's I gottasleep all winter, I gotta climb up
trees. It's pretty I could tipover a house if I want it.
You see that used to be Gary, and now he's a bear. I'm
Barry. Now he's very Now it'svery easy transition. What's what's you signed?
(26:23):
I'm backing away into the woods.Now, don't shoot don't shoot him.
Hey, hey, he's not aseal. I'm not a big demator.
Okay, I'm Mary see later.All right, now you will want
to hide your picnic basket a biggernigga Bascus. Another fun fact here,
(26:48):
Um, so the Russians who areliving there at the time. In nineteenth
century Russia, they were still onthe Julian calendar, which was different than
the America Gregorian calendar. Oh yeah, so in addition, our chants are
better. Yeah, the Gregorian chanceyeah, oh yeah, definitely. Uh
in the uh. In addition tochanging your nationality, you also had to
(27:12):
jump twelve days into the future.Whoa, the Julian calendar was twelve days
behind the Gregorian one. Wow,Well what do I do with all those
appointments? Do I have to stillpay for full rent? Yeah? There's
a lot. I feel like thatwould be much more difficult now, but
back in the day, just belike okay, ye, yeah, what
(27:33):
okay. You get a little madwhen it's February. You're like, I
was only here for twenty eight days. Yeah, you're like that. Imagine
suddenly being twelve days short. Themonths. We need to redo the months?
Yeah, you think should all bethe same, organize them. I
would love it to all be thesame. That'd be fine. What would
wouldn't you have to have one monththen be different to make up? Well,
(27:55):
maybe can go every other. Idon't know. I haven't done the
math. I just don't like whatwe have now. I'm actually I think
we should get like one weirdo monthand have all the ones we regular.
Yeah, and that weird month everybodytwenty seven days it's dead after Christmas anyway,
and all the other ones have thirtylike, whatever you need to do,
guys, figure yeah, yeah,whatever you need to do, all
right, So that the day ofthat that flag lowering in October eighteenth,
(28:18):
eighteen sixty seven was is still actuallycelebrated in Alaska. They it's called Alaska
Day and it's a holiday for stateworkers. They played the Alaskan old national
anthem. It's just berry. It'sgreat because it's like their birthday. Yeah,
(28:38):
it is their birthday. I gotI got one more thing for you
here. I got one more thingfor you here, just because I really
like the not only the mistakes thatwere made, but some of the alternate
realities that may have happened. Andso a uh, something I'd like to
throw out there is imagine if this, if Seward's folly ever went through,
(29:00):
an American never purchased Alaska. Imaginehaving the Cold War in the nineteen fifties
with the Alaska territory being Russian.That's scary, right, Yeah, that
that changes the feeling of that alot. Absolutely, they could put missiles
right there, they could have tanksand suddenly and you know, worrying about
(29:21):
some kind of land invasion. Imaginehow bonkers that would have been. And
they'd have all those bears. Yeah, they could send the bears over yeah,
oh yeah, and there. I'msure the Russians would have trained those
bears. Oh sure, Oh withthe little tiny hats and running the tiny
bicycle and the little two twos andthe shaking. Yeah. Don't you don't
need to tell me. You wantto know history on that, I'll tell
(29:41):
you. Oh. Yeah, theywere doing that well before we were,
you know, sending monkeys into space. Yeah, kind of their first with
animals. Yeah. Oh, theirteam was their team did the monkey into
space? The bears taught try tomake rockets to send monkeys into space.
Again, forgive me, I'm fullof useless facts. Do you know that
up until literally a couple of yearsago, Russian cosmonaut equipment still had a
(30:04):
shotgun in it? What why forbears? For when the pod landed off
target. Yeah, and you hadto be alone in the wilderness for a
while till they got you. Itwas god, oh my god. I
don't remember when they stopped that,but it was just a couple I think
it was just like ten years ago. That is like something you see in
(30:25):
Rocky for and you're like, that'sa lie. It's terrifying, but it's
much less terrifying than my initial thought, which was space bears. I became
an astro. No, it lookslike Barry, but I don't know.
Man. No, no, no, no, no. I think I'm
(30:45):
ready to call it. I thinkI'm ready to say mistakes remained? Any
any question, any questions? Doyou guys have anything else? Uh?
Pauling at you? Anything else?That was that all you? That all
you plan to tell us? That'sall I plan to tell you, guys
for this one here, for thisone. Well, we really screwed off,
Mike. We got derailed a bunch. Yeah. I like to bury
(31:06):
a lot. Yeah, and uhhe did just slip in a bear pun
there at the end. But anyany other questions, anything else you're wondering,
anything else going on? Oh?Man, what a mistake. What
a mistake by them, But whata sweet pickup for America. I love
that Seward was looking at for deals. He just had an eye for deal.
He was he was all about Americanexpansionism. He was sweet territory.
(31:32):
That's awesome. I love. That'show you play risk and that's how you
win. Yes, that is AndI just want to point out like you
could, because that that that argumentthat that man made up about, Hey,
America has taken on too much landalready, we can't control what we
have, and now we're going toadd even more, like we're not gonna
be able to control that. It'sgoing to be such a pain. Was
(31:52):
such a convincing argument for not doingit. Wasn't right in the long run.
No, no, very much notright. You know that old adage
about land, you better buy itbecause they're not making any more of it.
Yeah, well not in Hawaii rightnow. No. Yeah, fair
enough with the Chinese islands they're creatingin the Pacific, that's a story.
(32:13):
But let's uh, in general,not too much more is being made.
Yeah. Also, my favorite thingis that we put Alaska on layaway.
Basically we've moved there, we transferredownership, we refused to pay for like
two or three years. Yeah,the American way, that's like that.
There's a lot of a lot ofcomments about being oh he bought Alaska.
(32:35):
It's so cold, it's worthless,coming from people who live in like the
Midwest. All right, what doyou think? What do you think the
North Dakota is? Ah, Thesepeople sitting at lambeau Field judging the Alaska
purchase exactly. It's freezing up there. It is. It just gets to
(32:55):
a point where it's just okay whatever. I think it's beautiful. And Alaska
clock the coldest temperature. Oh really, I want to say, and think
it was. Do you know whatit is? Yes, the temperature dropped
to a record minus eighty degrees fahrenheitat Prospect Creek Camp in nineteen seventy one.
Jesus, Oh that's jelly. Youknow you're in a town. You
(33:19):
know you're in a small town whenit's camp insteadville or town or upgrade maybe
to like a town or no.I like my camps. I'm a camp
boy. I'll always be a campboy, and you're a camp girl.
They're gonna have a Hulu show aboutyou. I mean, well, there's
what. There's nine of us.I feel like that's enough for a village,
(33:42):
no camp, and you're lucky toget that. We used to have
ten, but then Barry went offin the woods. He'll be an astronaut.
I got I got a couple morefacts for you about a last they
round it out here. You've turnedinto Alaska. Fact Alaska. Alaska was
the forty ninth state. Second,Yeah, incorporated in what year? Eighteen
(34:07):
sixty? No, it was likenineteen fifty one. Oh, are really
that late in the game. Yeah, you're closer Mica nineteen fifty nine in
the decade. Again. Holy cow, there's people alive right now who are
listening to this who are like thatguy is an idiot. Yeah, I
mean I was alive. We tendto settle on like fifty states being a
(34:29):
nice round number, but that wasn'talways the case. They were not always
fifty wow. Obviously in my lifetimeeven recently. Yeah. Um so other
Alaska fact here my father's lifetime.During World War two, the Japanese actually
occupied to Alaska Islands. Oh Iknow about that. Yeah, yeah,
for about for a little over ayear, for fifteen months A two and
(34:51):
Kiska. They Alaska has about fivethousand earthquakes every year. Yeah, oh
wow, including the strongest earthquake everrecorded in North America. I guess magnitude
what ten, ten, ten,ten, ten, now ten would be
a couple of kind of bonkers sevenseven point fourteen, no, nine point
(35:13):
two. And it's tough with thethe earthquake scale as well, because the
Richt yeah, yeah, because nineis ten times more powerful than eight.
Yeah, it's been the nine isten to Wow, that is crazy.
I think when I was growing upin La I experienced like we had a
big one when I was there.It was like a six point something.
(35:36):
You could you can feel that one. That's that's that's a sizeable quake.
Oh. When I lived in Taiwanfor a year, we had like an
earthquake a week, and they're likesmaller, but you feel them. And
especially when we lived on like thelike the twenty eighth floor of a building,
so you could feel that thing swayingfor quite some time before it gets
back to normal. That's terrifying.It was awesome. Oh didn't I not
(36:00):
tell you this story? So duringone of the earthquakes, I was walking
into what's called the family mart,which is like a seven eleven, which
is basically what we have here.It's ever like more open and nicer,
I'd say. And I'm walking intothis family mart and a boom, earthquake
happens. Dude behind the cash registerruns out of the building. I like
(36:22):
freeze and like look around it,all the stuff shaking on the shelves,
and I'm like freaked out. I'mlike, oh, it's happening, Like
what do I do? And anold man pushes past me, opens up
the cooler in front of me,and reaches in the vertical coolerythingy with all
the fucking tea's shaken back and forth. I'll joss on around, grabs the
(36:46):
tea, pulls it out, shutsthe door, walks up, and when
he's walking up to the counter,it stops. He walks up to the
counter, sets the tea down,and starts going through his wallet to pull
up the money, and then hewaits for the guy to come back in
and phase for his tea face.I didn't move the entire time. He's
(37:08):
the kind of guy he's not goingto turn around and watch the explosion.
He's gonna he he was just soold. He's like so many I don't
care. Can me my tea andneed my tea? We're different. I
thought you were gonna say he wasgonna steal it. I mean crime is
really low. So we've done mistakesform made I think so mistakes made,
so many mistakes, and not byAmerica this time
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